The UN Climate Change Secretariat on Friday inaugurated a new portal to support the Talanoa Diaologue.
The new portal is aimed at encouraging international conversation for countries to check progress and seek increase global ambition to meet the Paris Climate Change Agreement.
A statement signed by UNFCC Spokesperson, Mr Nick Nuttall, said through the portal, all countries and other stakeholders, including business, investors, cities, regions and Civil Society Organisations (CSOs), would be able to make submissions into the Talanoa Dialogue.
The News Agency Of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the Dialogue was launched at the UN Climate Change Conference COP23 in Bonn in Nov. 2017, and will run throughout 2018.
The Paris Agreement’s central goal is to keep the global average temperature rise to below 2C degrees and as close as possible to 1.5C.
Nuttall said the dialogue also centered around three central questions of “Where are we, Where do we want to go, and How do we get there’’.
He added that countries and non-Party stakeholders would be contributing ideas, recommendations and information that could assist the world in taking climate action to the next level.
This according to him is to meet the objectives of the Paris Agreement and support the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
“Present global ambition to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and to prepare societies to resist increasing climate change is not enough to achieve this under the present national climate action plans known as Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs).
“The portal is the gateway for the Talanoa Dialogue. It represents the central point for everyone to make their views heard around enhanced ambition. Additionally, it will make available other key resources for the dialogue.
“I very much welcome the portal because it provides transparency and broadens participation in the dialogue.
“I look forward to many governments and other actors making their submissions via the portal as part of world-wide efforts required for the next level of climate action and ambition,’’ Patricia Espinosa, Executive Secretary of UN Climate Change said.
The Pacific island concept of ‘Talanoa’ was introduced by Fiji, which held the Presidency of the COP23 UN Climate Change Conference.
It aims at an inclusive, participatory and transparent dialogue.
It would be recalled that the Minister of State for Environment, Ibrahim Jibril, had said Nigeria’s Nationally Determined Contributions’ (NDC) ambition under Climate Change Accord will cost estimated 142 billion dollars to meet the 2030 target.
The minister said: “the delivery of our NDC will require a fundamental re-orientation of financial flows within the economy.
“It is estimated that Nigeria will require around 142 billion dollars, translating to about 10 billion dollars per annum to meet her NDC target by 2030,” he said.
He said Nigeria had recognised that climate change presented one of the greatest challenges of the world today.
Jibril said Nigeria was partnering with the Lake Chad basin countries to address the challenges of drying up of the lake which would have adverse consequences on the people and the ecosystem.