General News
On the 16th of September a side event hosted at the 3rd Pacific Environment Forum featured a Mr David Sheppard, Director-General of SPREP, Mr Espen Ronneberg SPREP's Climate Change Adviser and Ms. Sili'a Ualesi Kilepoa the Project Manager of the Pacific Islands Greenhouse Gas Abatement through Renewable Energy Project (PIGGAREP).

The side event was opened by Mr. David Sheppard who provided a brief overview to the development of SIDS Dock. He was followed by a joint presentation by Silia Ualesi Kilepoa and Espen Ronneberg.

Espen provided details on the political direction that gave rise to the SIDS Dock concept, namely the need to have a dedicated funding mechanism for SIDS to access for mitigation. In addition such a mechanism would free up resources for adaptation and other climate change work in country.

The establishment of SIDS Dock was spearheaded by SPREP staff working in cooperation with Caribbean Community Climate Change Centre (5Cs), and a final concept was submitted to the Alliance of Small Island States.

Promo SIDS

This was launched at the Cancun COP in 2011 with financial resources in the amount of US$14.5 million committed by the Government of Denmark. This has since been added to by the Government of Japan with US$15 million in 2013. So far 6 projects have been approved for the region in Tonga, Tuvalu, Solomon Islands, Palau, FSM and RMI. A further 3 projects are in the pipeline for Cook Islands, Samoa and Vanuatu. In addition funds will be appropriated for research on Ocean Thermal Energy Conversion in RMI, as a SIDS specific and globally significant technology under SIDS Dock.

NiueMr. Sauni Tongatule of Niue asks a question during the SIDS Dock side event

Questions were raised in relation to the governance of SIDS Dock, and the functioning of the Board and Assembly were explained. Basically SIDS Dock is SIDS owned and controlled, giving greater opportunity to project development that are Pacific priorities.

Questions were also raised regarding the overheads of SIDS Dock, and the need for SIDS Dock to be a lean organisation was explained. The working procedures would be to work closely with SPREP, SPC and PPA in implementation and thus reduce management costs.

Participants welcomed the opportunity of SIDS Dock and requested regular updates from SPREP.