Minister of Planning and Development, Penelope Beckles, assured the international community T&T is moving towards a renewable future as she delivered a national statement at the 27th Conference of Parties (COP27) on Tuesday afternoon in Sharm El-Sheikh, Egypt where the event is being held.
Beckles is leading T&T’s delegation at the high-level climate talks. She called on the international community to act pointing out T&T has seen unprecedented rainfall this year which has led to people losing their homes and to irreparable damage.
“This must be an implementation COP. Even while we enhance our ambition it is important that we shift into transformational implementation. We must move beyond pledges to action,” she told the delegates present at Plenary Nefertiti, the room in which the delegates are delivering their speeches.
The minister also touted T&T’s push towards a renewable future saying, “T&T is undertaking widespread policy reform to support implementation of the Paris Agreement. Step by step, we are creating the architecture that will guide us towards a just and equitable transition to a low carbon development pathway.”
Minister Beckles said the world must come together and assist small islands to stave off the effects of climate change. She added, “A lot has been done, but I admit, we need to go further. We cannot do this alone. We count on the support of the international community to help us further our national implementation efforts to tackle the climate crisis, in particular, we would welcome proposals from an international platform to assist countries in their just transition planning. Such a platform would be a useful forum for sharing experiences and lessons learned on these critical activities.”
This story was originally published in the Trinidad and Tobago Guardian, with the support of Climate Tracker’s COP27 Climate Justice Journalism Fellowship.
