Monday 03rd April 2023
The Boao Forum for Asia (BFA), an international event jointly attended by 29 member states and hosted by the People’s Republic of China, convenes annually in Boao, Hainan Province, China. The annual development event is organized to promote economic integration in Asia and its partner countries around the world with an aim to pool resources for the development of Asia and the world.
With the progress of economic globalization and regional integration, Asian countries have been faced with great opportunities as well as severe challenges. This concept required the region to strengthen cooperation with other parts of the world and enhance mutual exchanges and cooperation.
It now has become a high-level dialogue platform for the political, business and academic leaders from Asia and other continents to discuss key Asian and global issues.
Though Papua New Guinea is not a member to the BFA, Hon. Justin Tkatchenko, Minister of Foreign Affairs of Papua New Guinea was invited as a special guest by the Minister of Foreign Affairs and State Counselor of the People’s Republic of China, His Excellency Qin Gang to attend the Forum as well as a convening a bilateral meeting between the two Foreign Ministers.
At the Boao Development forum, Foreign Minister Tkatchenko was part of a five men panelists to lead on discussions on a selected topic of “Extreme Weather and Climate Change”.
In his opening remarks, Foreign Minister Tkatchenko stressed on the lack of commitment and effective collaboration with the industrialized countries and smaller island developing countries like Papua New Guinea.
Foreign Minister Tkatchenko also stated outrightly that as developing country, PNG as a carbon emission absorber and third largest rainforest nation in the world, has been a victim of the climate change calamity which it has not been a major contributor to.
“The industrialized nations must do more to assist developing and small island countries that are at the frontlines of the climate change phenomenon with financial and technical assistance to manage the climate change negatives impacts” Minister Tkatchenko commented.
Furthermore, Foreign Minister Tkatchenko addressed the forum on the rigid and cumbersome processes and procedures in accessing the funds from the International Organizations like Climate Funds, Global Green Growth Institute (GGGI) and others. Whilst we are fighting with the systems, the impacts of climate change and extreme weather is taking toll on lives, economies, infrastructure and affecting lifestyle of our people.
Finally, Foreign Minister Tkatchenko informed the conference that for Papua New Guinea, it would rather opt to engage more with bilateral partners the easiest and efficient way of attending to climate change negative effects rather than going through the established multilateral mechanisms.
Cooperation and collaboration with bilateral partners the preferred option that PNG will be inclined towards and looked forward to working with bilateral partners like China in building our capacities and capabilities in dealing with extreme weather effects and climate change impacts.