Flora Vano has been at COP28 all week for the critical global climate negotiations, representing women and Pacific communities as ActionAid’s Country Office in Vanuatu. She shares her experiences from the first week.
Being at COP is a simultaneously exciting and frustrating experience. I am excited I can be here and have a voice through which to influence for better climate policy that centres the experiences of women and girls from small island states like my home of Vanuatu.
But like so many climate activists, I am frustrated that we are continuing to fight the same battles against the fossil fuel industry.
The science is clear. We cannot offer up more lifelines and excuses for climate-wrecking fossil fuel industries. Yet, fossil fuel lobbyists are out in droves at this year’s conference with the most recent analysis revealing that at least 2456 fossil fuel lobbyists have been granted access. This is a record number. When you hear figures like this it is easy to feel hopeless and disheartened.
But I can feel momentum to secure a commitment from world leaders to phase out of fossil fuels and fund solutions to the climate crisis building. At the start of COP, the Loss and Damage Fund was official announced. Now we must push wealthy governments like Australia to fill the fund so the most climate vulnerable nations can recover and rebuild after climate disasters.
We are also out here pushing hard for fossil fuel phase out and applying pressure where it is needed. We’ve seen more than 1,000 climate scientists stand together at COP to urge the public to become climate activists. We at ActionAid took a stand to call out the global financial flows that are funnelling money into climate destruction rather than climate action.
And this week, I will be delivering the signatures of almost 5000 Australians and 9000 Ni Vanuatu women who are demanding Australia commit to phasing out fossil fuels. People around the world are tired of inaction, and they are making it known.
Nevertheless, once again, we are not seeing enough women from climate-vulnerable communities in decision-making spaces at COP. This is despite the well-known fact that women and girls bear the brunt of climate impacts.
Out of the 140 world leaders scheduled to speak at COP, only 15 of them are women. This shocks me and raises the question: will we see fair, accessible, gender inclusive resourcing being put towards Loss and Damage and climate adaptation without diverse women at the decision-making table?
This is why I am at COP to share the stories and experiences of women in Vanuatu. To tell world leaders that climate change is a very real threat for us. I have come to COP carrying the experiences, voices and demands of the 9000 Ni Vanuatu women I work with through the Women I Tok Tok Tugeta Network. I want to make sure the realities of women and girls in my country is being seen and heard.
Vanuatu has always been a nation prone to disasters. I remember there were storms when I was little, but they were not as often as now. This year alone, we have been struck by three powerful cyclones. Just as we are recovering from one cyclone, a new one strikes. We’re exhausted.
We grow our food, but climate disasters destroy the harvest. We build our livelihoods, but climate disasters take away our financial independence. We claim our rights, but climate disasters expose us to a greater risk of violence. The cycle seems endless. This is the reality for so many women living in communities like mine on the frontline of climate catastrophe and should be all the proof leaders need to commit to a fossil fuel free future.
The limit of 1.5 degrees of warming is not just a target. For the Pacific and women and their communities living on the frontlines of the climate crisis it is a limit of what we can endure. And it is time for world leaders to listen to us, invest in us, and support us to create a climate safe world.