Underscoring that Small Island and low-lying coastal Developing States (SIDS) are particularly vulnerable to climate change, and have been internationally recognized as a special case for sustainable development.
Recalling the Special Report of the IPCC on 1.5°C and the recent IPCC Report which confirms that the current decade is the final opportunity to keep 1.5°C within reach.
Gravely concerned that global average warming has already reached 1.2°C, and the prospect of exceeding 1.5°C in the 2030s is imminent, noting in this regard that the IPCC projects that global warming could rise to 2.7°C by the end of the century.
Alarmed that even at 1.5°C SIDS will continue to experience the worsening of slow onset events and extreme events including more intense storms, along with heavy or continuous rainfall events, ocean acidification, increased marine heatwaves, rising sea levels together with storm surges resulting in coastal inundation, saltwater intrusion into aquifers and shoreline retreat, as well as the continued overall decline in rainfall, increased aridity, and more severe agricultural and ecological droughts.
Recognizing that these impacts threaten both human and natural systems and that the already steep social, economic and environmental costs have already exceeded the Region’s overall capacity to adapt.
Underscoring thus the limits to the region’s adaptive capacity, the increasing evidence and the growing toll of loss and damage, with cataclysmic and existential implications for the Caribbean.
Emphasizing with consternation that while the Region emits roughly 0.2% of global greenhouse gases, it is disproportionately bearing the costs of a climate crisis it did not create.
Further emphasizing that the ineligibility of CARICOM Members to access grant or concessionary support has contributed to increasing unsustainable debt burdens that are grossly exacerbated by the economic fallout from the continuing COVID-19 pandemic as well as other shocks including extreme weather events.
Noting that developed countries have failed to deliver on the long-term climate finance goal of providing at least USD100 billion per annum by 2020, and continue to channel most resources to mitigation, with adaptation making up merely 20 percent of climate finance thus far.
Noting also that the scale of the current finance goal and the rate of disbursement of financing is incommensurate with the scale of the needs of developing countries to implement their climate plans which are estimated to be in the range of trillions of dollars.
Noting that despite the climate crisis not being of their making, SIDS have had to use their own resources, constrained by COVID, debt, a lack of policy and fiscal space wrought by global financial norms and inflexible rules, an absence of support, and, for some, the millstone of being classified as middle-income countries, to finance the climate crisis, jeopardizing progress towards the attainment of the Sustainable Development Goals.
Highlighting thus the need for a new collective quantified goal on climate finance that shifts from billions to trillions and adequately as well as predictably addresses the needs of developing countries in a timely fashion.
Taking note of the UNFCCC Synthesis Report which concludes that current NDCs fall far short of the mitigation ambition to maintain global temperatures below 1.5°C, and highlighting in particular that the major emitters especially those with historic responsibility have not submitted NDCs consistent with 1.5°C.
Underscoring that members of the Group of 20, who account for 75 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions, have the greatest mitigation potential to curb emissions and keep 1.5°C within reach.
Recognizing that the Conferences of the Parties to the Convention, the Kyoto Protocol and the Paris Agreement are meeting for the first time since the COVID-19 pandemic and that it is expected to complete the Paris Agreement Work Programme in order to strengthen accountability, transparency and ensure environmental integrity, in line with the Paris Agreement and its subsequent Work Programme.
Recognizing also that this COP marks the first five-year cycle since the adoption of the Paris Agreement and therefore it is a first opportunity to examine Nationally Determined Contributions in light of the goals of the Paris Agreement.
Convinced that, in light of the foregoing, COP26 is the last best chance to keep 1.5°C within reach.
Resolved to engage across all of society to amplify a robust regional response to climate change, and motivated to do so to secure a safe climate future for our young people,