Remarks by Commissioner Hoekstra at Pre-COP31 Opening and Keynote Session — Keeping 1.5 Within Reach

It's an exceptional pleasure to be in the Pacific and to be back here in Fiji.

Let me start by commending the tremendous leadership of Fiji, Tuvalu, and of course our Australian friends in this whole endeavour.

Being here today at pre-COP is an absolute priority.

The summer we just lived through in Europe reaffirmed a sobering reality: it was the hottest on record, but in all likelihood the coolest of the decade we have ahead of us.

And of course, similar statistics are true for the world at large.

In September, science delivered another hard truth.

According to the recent UNEP report on Limiting Overshoot, the world is expected to cross 1.5°C of global warming above pre-industrial levels in the next few years.

That means we're talking about survival of the world as we know it.

We need to double down on our mitigation action to ensure that any temperature breach is as shallow and as brief as humanly possible.

To achieve this, we see four priorities:

First, let's agree to be much more assertive in making sure we close the global ambition gap. That means staying as close as possible to 1.5°C.

And that means all parties need to submit their NDCs and align them to a 1.5°C pathway.

In COP31, we should also showcase support for demonstrable and scalable solutions on the ground that can accelerate our clean transition.

Our second priority is to continue putting together the means for ambitious action and stand shoulder-to-shoulder with the most vulnerable.

That means that we must deliver on and defend agreed outcomes, such as those related to the New Collective Quantified Goal on climate finance.

We support facilitating access to finance, reducing existing constraints and barriers to climate finance access and working with all actors to improve access for developing countries.

Third, showing that the Paris Agreement is fit for purpose also means that we should initiate a process for improving the efficiency and the effectiveness of the UNFCCC regime.