Fiji has raised the issue of the challenge that Pacific Island States face as most of climate finance was channeled towards mitigation rather than adaptation.
The Attorney General and Minister responsible for Climate Change, Aiyaz Sayed‑Khaiyum highlighted this while speaking at the Climate Action Pacific Partnership Conference being held at GPH in Suva where he also raised issues on innovative climate financing lessons from the frontline.
Sayed-Khaiyum says the Pacific is more focused on ‘adaptation’ however most funds go to ‘mitigation’ and that the task now is to attract more finance from the private sector towards the adaptation space.
He highlighted how the ‘Drua Incubator’ was being used to bring about a scalable finance and insurance product for the Pacific region to be able to make it available to the Pacific Island countries.
The Attorney General also used Green Bonds as an innovative and attractive way to bring in the private sector.
Sayed-Khaiyum also spoke on financing projects in developing countries that pose numerous unique challenges specific to the region.