Hon Seve Paeniu
Minister for Finance and Chair of the Pacific Islands Forum Economic Ministers Meeting (FEMM)
Launching Statement
Ocean Finance Reports
12 February 2020
Secretary General & Pacific Ocean Commissioner
Members of the Diplomatic Corp
Representatives of international development partners
Representatives of regional organisations
Ladies and gentlemen
Warm greetings and Talofa from Tuvalu.
I am very privileged for this opportunity to officially launch the Seven Ocean Finance Reports – which marks the start of a successful collaboration between the Forum Fisheries Agency, the Office of the Pacific Ocean Commissioner, the Pacific Island Forum Secretariat and the World Bank, on this space.
These Ocean Finance Reports cover areas such as i) taxes/subsidies and their alignment to ocean health objectives, ii) finance models for marine protected areas, iii) innovative insurance mechanisms for protecting ocean assets, iv) ocean bond structures and accessibility, v) financing models for different types of community managed marine areas – all are novel and innovative.
With support from the World Bank and the Global Environment Facility for the Pacific Regional Oceanscape Program under component 3; these reports were delivered together with a pool of expertise on these areas that were contracted to conduct these assignments. There is a long list of these expert individuals, organisations, companies so I won’t name them, but I want to acknowledge them for their ground-breaking work for our Blue Pacific Continent.
The launching and dissemination of these Ocean Finance Reports today, contributes to the fulfilment of some of our 2020 FEMM outcomes (e.g. decision 15(v) of 2020 FEMM outcomes). This is in relation to Forum Island Countries’ plea to our Development Partners and International Financial Institutions, to explore and provide levels of support on innovative financing measures to support the economic recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic and our own economic growth.
These reports would add to the growing body of knowledge and work on increasing the amount and efficacy of finance for the sustainable use of our vast Ocean. The reports would also be excellent repositioning materials for our engagement in emerging global ocean finance initiatives, the likes of ADB Ocean Plan, World Bank ProBlue, and many more.
On a more serious note, the three prolonged crisis – COVID-19 health pandemic, Climate change crisis and the on-going Economic crisis that we face should motivate us to be innovative in, smartly invest on, and lean towards our “Ocean” – taking full advantage of the most we have. There is a sense of urgency now to look at diversification of revenue streams, reduce dependencies on tuna license fees but increase returns, increase equity of fund distribution to adequately manage our ocean resources, explore and execute debt-for-nature swaps and more innovative financing mechanisms. These reports provide thought-provoking measures and strategies in these regards.
Ladies and gentlemen,
I would like to draw your attention to the fact that the monetary value of our entire Blue Pacific Ocean is worth hundreds of billions of dollars (Melanesian ocean area itself is worth US$548 Billion[1]). With that in mind and further encouraged by these Ocean Finance reports – we have to be creative, think big and start to explore new and innovative financing streams from our Blue Pacific Ocean endowment fund. These require dedication and transformative actions to mobilise/deploy sustainable investments and policies today, that will ensure maximum benefits from our ocean resources, build resilience, and enable us to meet the full cost of our future development. Ocean finance is our new but significant part of the public finance management machinery like climate finance, disaster finance, and more.
The Blue Pacific Ocean Report 2021 that will be launched by the Pacific Ocean Commissioner, wrap up these two discourses together which is: ocean finance is indeed a central means of implementing the overall ocean policies/commitments and aspirations of our Blue Pacific Continent.
Ladies and gentlemen, it is an honor to launch the Seven Ocean Finance Reports.
I wish you all well and Thank You.
