Conference Green Days

First of all, let me thank you for inviting me to take part to this panel and also to greet you all on behalf of United Nations team in Montenegro.

GLOBAL

Dear friends, we’ve heard in the introduction some dramatic forecast of climate change impact on this region in a very near future. Before I say anything, may I tell you that until just a couple of days ago – just this May, Podgorica was under the heaviest rain flow in decades for this time of year. Neither that nor other climate climaxes the country faced in the last decade have been accidents. Those are early, but very signals of climate change. Other parts of the world have been less lucky. Many countries are already facing continuous extreme weather conditions such as typhons and hurricanes, devastating fires, floods and droughts. After all, climate change represents the greatest threat to achieving 2030 Agenda and SDGs, as it seriously affects water supply, food production, health, ecosystems, energy security, tourism and infrastructure.

Due to growing climate urgency, the UN Secretary General will gather world leaders at the United Nations Headquarters in September on the High-Level Conference on Climate Change. He will have a clear message: “The clock is ticking, and the stakes are high. We need to act.”

This high-level gathering will provide world leaders with a unique opportunity: a) to take stock of progress made since the historic agreements of 2015; b) to increase ambition to implement the Paris Agreement on Climate Change and commitment for our collective response and c) to highlight scalable, just and tailored solutions to some of the world's biggest challenges.

The Summit is expected to showcase a leap in collective political ambition and to demonstrate, hopefully, massive movements in the real economy in support of the achieving the objectives of the Paris Agreement and the Sustainable Development Goals.

MONTENEGRO

Montenegro will take part in the Summit, too. So far, the country has been responsible global partner on Climate Action. Although being low-emission country, Montenegro signed the Paris agreement and committed to reduce its carbon emissions by 30 percent to a 1990 base year. It is also very important that Montenegro strongly recognized Climate change in its National Strategy for Sustainable Development by 2030. Also, another important contribution is through country’s major development driving force – the EU Accession process, through which Montenegro commits to reduce emissions by 20 percent 2020 and 40 percent 2030.

Precondition for tackling such complex problem is inter-sectoral cooperation, coordinated and collaborative approach to integrate SDG 13 - Climate Action in national strategies, institutional coordination, financing, monitoring, evaluation and reporting.

Like in many other countries, climate change affects many sectors, including tourism, agriculture, fishing, but also health, water resources. We in the UN System work closely with national actors to support them in addressing this omni present problem, on number of fronts, including nature preservation through increase of protected areas, introducing low carbon culture in growing tourism industry, greening hotels and music festivals initiatives, and so on.

Some are greater, and some are small interventions. But it’s crucial to understand that every single effort counts.

Dear friends, climate change is the defining issue of our time and now is the defining moment to do something about it. There is still time to tackle climate change, but it will require an unprecedented effort from all sectors of society.