Lord Mayor of Hobart, Anna Reynolds delivered a Statement on behalf of all Australian capital cities at the Seoul Mayors Forum last week outlining their commitment to climate and calling for stronger cooperation with the Australian Government. The Lord Mayor also spoke at a high level plenary at the Forum and was interviewed for ICLEI’s CityTalk blog.
ICLEI Oceania and the Council of Capital City Lord Mayors (CCCLM) are attending the Seoul Mayors’ Forum on Climate Change on 23-25 October. The CCCLM Chair, Lord Mayor of Hobart Anna Reynolds will be presenting at the forum in support of ICLEI’s Global Covenant of Mayors for Climate and Energy (GCoM)
Closing last month’s UN Climate Action Summit, UN, Secretary-General António Guterres said, “You have delivered a boost in momentum, cooperation and ambition. But we have a long way to go... we need more concrete plans, more ambition from more countries and more businesses. We need all financial institutions, public and private, to choose, once and for all, the green economy.”
Exploring the impacts of climate change on the ocean and cryosphere, the latest IPCC report shows that oceans have never been more significant. The IPCC’s Special Report on Oceans and Cryosphere acknowledges that the ocean and cryosphere are not only connected to ecosystem functioning, food and water security and economics, but are a crucial part of culture and identity. In acknowledging this, the report acknowledges that the ocean and cryosphere changes directly affect each of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals.
ICLEI joined forces with several partner organisations in early September to assist Honiara City Council to plan for disasters and climate change in some of the highest risk settlements in Honiara. These settlements are threatened by frequent flooding, landslides, severe storms, tidal flooding and even tsunamis.
On 23 September 2019, the Secretary-General of the United Nations, António Guterres, hosted the Climate Action Summit with the objective of boosting ambition and rapidly accelerating action to implement the Paris Agreement.
Following the Climate Action Summit in New York, new reports explore the possibilities and challenges for implementing our vision for a climate-safe future.
To the Members of ICLEI: This past June, many from our network gathered at the 10th Anniversary Resilient Cities Congress. I was delighted to welcome a record number of participating local governments to the Congress in Bonn. We also kicked off the first official high-level dialogues on multilevel action at the mid-year United Nations climate talks.
ICLEI Global has appointed Mayor Valérie Plante of Montréal as the world’s first Global Ambassador on Local Biodiversity. The science is in - it’s not too late to regenerate biodiversity.
As climate change issues evolve rapidly, is our language able to keep up? Are we doing ourselves and the environment a disservice by using language that is so-2007? On the 20th of August on a calm evening at the University of Melbourne more than 20 students gathered for a two-hour discussion on how climate change language has transformed over the past decade.
Honiara, capital city of the Solomon Islands, is a magnet for people from the outer islands and rural areas. But most of these people are forced to settle in the outer fringes of Honiara, many on the steep hills or along the coast and rivers. They have no formal tenure and often no electricity, water, sanitation or decent road access.
For the first time in Australia’s history, councils have motioned for the federal government to declare a national climate emergency. The motion was passed emphatically at the Australian Local Government Association’s (ALGA) National General Assembly in Canberra this week.