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Climate Change: Its Impact on Panama, Protest Activities, Establishment of Second HQ for Green Climate Fund, The UN's Convention on Climate Change, etc.


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Climate Change and Center for Tropical Forest Management

At a UN climate change meeting, Panama President Varela proposed an international center for tropical forest management and the fight against deforestation. Here is a link to the news article: http://www.newsroompanama.com/news/panama/varela-proposes-tropical-forest-management-center.

What effect might this program have on the teak farms here in Panama? Investors may want to keep alert for changes in agricultural opportunities.

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ENVIRONMENT: Panama ratifies climate change accord

Posted on September 12, 2016 in Environment, Panama

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WHILE activists are protesting the environmental damage from a development bordering the Canal, Panama ratified an agreement on climate change and announced a reforestation plan.

On Monday, September 12 President Juan Carlos Varela, Chancellor Isabel de Saint Malo de Alvarado and Minister of the Environment Mirei Endara signed an act that ratifies the Paris Accord.

Varela said that Panama is the 28th country to ratify the agreement.

“We are sharing the goal of protecting the planet,” he said.

The president also stressed that Panama has already put in place an initiative it proposed in December 2015 at a climate change conference.

The Paris agreement was passed to replace the Kyoto Protocol.

During the activity, Endara said that Panama has a 20-year reforestation plan.

http://www.newsroompanama.com/environment/environment-panama-ratifies-climate-change-accord

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Rising Sea Levels Threaten Tiny Islands Home To Indigenous Panamanians

Sea rise is threatening the way of life for a Panamanian indigenous group that lives on islands off the Caribbean coast. They're now pondering moving back to the mainland and abandoning their way of life.

KELLY MCEVERS, HOST:

A hundred-and-fifty years ago, the Guna people of Panama left the mainland to escape deadly mosquitoes that carried malaria. They ended up in low-lying islands in the Caribbean. But now rising sea levels are forcing the Guna people to go back to the mainland, and that is changing the way they live. Jacob McCleland of member station KGOU reports.

JACOB MCCLELAND, BYLINE: Jaime Avila zooms his motorboat over clear blue Caribbean water and tosses a baited hook overboard. Avila, like many indigenous Gunas who live off of Panama's Northeastern coast, used to fish every day. Now instead of fishing, he mostly shuttles tourists from island to island. But the water is now the enemy.

JAIME AVILA: (Speaking Spanish).

MCCLELAND: "Because Arctic ice is melting," he says, and that means rising sea levels fueled by climate change threaten to swamp the Guna's tiny islands flecking Panama's coast. And leaders in Avila's community, Gardi Sugdub, a tiny island about a mile from the coast, plan to relocate to a hereditary tropical rain forest on the mainland. Avila says they'll lose a long tradition of living off the sea.

AVILA: (Through interpreter) I believe we'll lose a little bit of that style. We'll always be surrounded by a mountain landscape, by green.

MCCLELAND: Heliodoro Hartman is an elementary school teacher. Standing outside the school, he points to a line along the wall where high tide now reaches just short of flooding the small building. The rising tide has been gradual. People are becoming accustomed to this, he says.

HELIODORO HARTMAN: (Speaking Spanish).

MCCLELAND: He says last year, a violent storm ripped the roof right off the school and brought a surge of seawater that swamped the island. The view from the school is stunning. It sits amid thatched huts just yards from the water's edge. But the location has become a liability.

Community leader Blas Lopez leads me through Gardi Sugdub's sandy paths. He says many Guna travel by boat to the mainland every day where they farm, hunt and fetch fresh water for their islands. Satellite images show the Guna's uninhabited islands are shrinking, and scientists estimate the sea along Panama's Caribbean coast is going up by about 4 millimeters a year. That may seem like nothing, but these islands barely peak above the water's surface.

BLAS LOPEZ: (Speaking Spanish).

MCCLELAND: Lopez says, "Guna communities could disappear within 50 to a hundred years," and that threatens a vibrant island culture where children practice traditional songs and dances like this one and the indigenous Guna language is more commonly spoken than Spanish.

The Guna bear some of the responsibility for the strong storm surges that torment their islands. For years, they mined nearby reefs and used the coral to expand the size of their islands, removing a natural barrier that protects them from the waves. In June, the Panamanian government promised to build housing for 300 families who have signed up to move. But progress is slow, and there's no basic infrastructure on the mainland like plumbing, electricity and trash service. Pablo Presiado is one of Gardi Sugdub's seven sailas - a spiritual leader who makes decisions for the island. He says people shouldn't panic and move before a new home is ready.

PABLO PRESIADO: (Through interpreter) Where are we going to go to the bathroom, or where we going to get rid of our trash? There's no electricity. There are mosquitoes. There's no food. There are no stores. How are we going to go there now?

MCCLELAND: If Gardi Sugdub succeeds in moving, it'll be the first documented indigenous community in Latin America to relocate as a result of climate change according to international human rights organization Displacement Solutions. Other Guna communities - about 28,000 people in total - are watching closely to learn from Gardi Sugdub's experience. Community leader Blas Lopez says many of the island's older residents are hesitant.

LOPEZ: (Speaking Spanish).

MCCLELAND: "They want to live like they live now," he says, "next to the sea." Lopez says he'll miss the island life. He's been fishing and swimming in the ocean since he was a little kid. But now he's psychologically prepared to move. For NPR News, I'm Jacob McCleland.

MCEVERS: Imagine a forest that has taken your breath away, and then imagine going to visit the forest again and seeing nothing, like, for an hour as you keep driving and driving. That is what's happening in Brazil's rainforest, and it's what NPR photographer Kainaz Amaria documented during two weeks she recently spent in the Amazon. You can see her pictures at npr.org/brazil.

AUDIE CORNISH, HOST:

We want you to visit the site and understand why the issue is so complicated.

Copyright © 2015 NPR. All rights reserved. Visit our website terms of use and permissions pages at www.npr.org for further information.

NPR transcripts are created on a rush deadline by Verb8tm, Inc., an NPR contractor, and produced using a proprietary transcription process developed with NPR. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Accuracy and availability may vary. The authoritative record of NPR’s programming is the audio record.

 

https://www.npr.org/2015/11/12/455797433/rising-sea-levels-threaten-tiny-islands-home-to-indigenous-panamanians

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  • Moderator_02 changed the title to Rising Sea Levels Threaten Tiny Islands That Are Home To Indigenous Panamanians
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Rising sea levels threaten Panama's indigenous Guna community

The indigenous culture is a silent culture – islanders have been silenced about ecocide and other injustices on their land for centuries. But Giovanny Barrantes hopes music can be a new way to share the feelings of his people.

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Women sing and dance during anniversary celebrations of the Guna Revolution in Ustupu, an island in the Guna Yala region on Panama's Caribbean coast. Tribe members commemorate the February 25, 1925 clash with police with parades and dances. ( AP )

Panama's indigenous Guna people are threatened by climate change. As the Caribbean Sea level continues to rise, the residents are considering abandoning the islands they have lived on for generations. 

Giovanny Barrantes, a member of the tribe, found a way to express his people’s feelings – through music.

He hopes through his music he can make an impact on the silent indigenous community Guna which has been damaged "by western cultures for many centuries by disrespecting trees and animals."

TRT World's Anelise Borges has more.

 

https://www.trtworld.com/life/rising-sea-levels-threaten-panama-s-indigenous-guna-community-12828

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Panama: Climate change could force out entire island indigenous community

Rising sea levels due to climate change are forcing one of Panama’s most well-known indigenous groups to draw up plans to relocate from their autonomous island territories to the mainland.

Follow Eye On Latin America on Twitter @eye_on_latam for regular updates and the best the web has to offer on Latin America!

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One of the hundreds of islands making up the Guna Yala archipelago in the Caribbean Sea off the coast of Panama. Rising sea levels attributed to climate change are forcing the islands’ indigenous communities to make plans for their evacuation to mainland Panama. Photo courtesy of El País.

The first few days of September have seen a UN-sponsored Conference on Small Island Developing States (SIDS) take place in Samoa, with a focus on developing a global strategy for aiding small island nations which are set to find their very existence threatened by sea-level rise as a result of climate change. Much of the emphasis in this strategy is on publicising the plight of these island nations which, despite having historically made minimal contributions to global emissions of greenhouse gases, are likely to find themselves in the firing line as climate change begins to wreak havoc across the globe.

And yet, on the other side of the Pacific in a country that isn’t even a member of SIDS, the apparently ‘future’ prospect of entire communities being forcibly displaced as the sea swallows up their territory is, in fact, already a reality. For thousands of indigenous Guna people living in an archipelago of some 360 islands, known as Guna Yala and situated off the Caribbean coast of Panama, climate change is a very current hazard as rising sea levels begin to hammer away at the islands’ shores, flooding settlements and the precious little arable land on offer. The phenomenon has led to a major operation being drawn up to relocate, bit by bit, the 30,000 or so Guna back to the Panamanian mainland from which they moved over 150 years ago.

Whatever the overall extent of the evacuation, it now seems almost inevitable that, at the very least, considerable contingents of the Guna Yala community will be forced to relocate, which observers have pointed out would be one of the first instances in the world of rising sea levels caused by man-made climate change forcing inhabitants of islands or coastal areas to be evacuated. They would be joining communities from Pacific nations such as Fiji, Vanuatu and Kiribati who have already become ‘climate refugees’, with some experts warning they could be joined by millions more from around the world by the end of the century if climate change continues to melt the polar ice caps and lead to higher sea levels.

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Guna children steer a canoe round an island in Guna Yala. Photo courtesy of Reuters / Alberto Lowe.

This fate is one that seems to have been accepted by many of the 2,000 or so inhabitants of Gartí Sugdup, one of the biggest islands in the archipelago that can also go by the name of San Blas, and a plan of action has been in motion for some years now. Community members have begun to clear rainforest within a 300,000 hectare area of forested foothills near the Caribbean coastline in the eastern part of mainland Panama, where they will be able to maintain the special administrative autonomy they currently enjoy over their island territory. They are receiving limited on-the-ground support from the Panamanian government, which has nonetheless given its backing to the Guna’s relocation plans and pledged to fulfil its constitutional duties of providing services such as health, education, and infrastructure once the mainland community has begun to settle properly.

The Guna people are dotted around 50 or so of the archipelago’s largest islands, some of which have been ‘built up’ by mining coral from the surrounding reefs. As well as benefitting from limited tourism that brings some of the more adventurous travellers to their islands, the Guna are largely dependent on fishing and agriculture for their cultural and economic survival, but this is increasingly under threat as their land has been interrupted by periodic ocean swells and abnormally high tides. While flooding and inundation is not unheard of in the area – some of the smaller islets in particular come and go as sand banks are shifted over time – the inhabitants of Guna Yala have noted a definite increase in the number and severity of such incidents in recent years, as well as the fact that these events have started to happen outside the usual ‘season’ of November to April.

“Our people, who have lived their entire lives in the sea, don’t want to leave the islands but they are aware of the imminent danger”, explains Atencio López, a Guna leader and lawyer well respected both within the Guna Yala region and across Panama, in an interview with the Spanish newspaper El País (link in Spanish). “It’s hard to explain overnight to the elder generations that they need to abandon their homes”. However, as López explains, “the islands are collapsing and their communities will have to cross over to terra firma before the rise in sea levels happens, as we’ve been warned will happen with climate change”.

The El País report continues to add that of the 50 or so different island communities in Guna Yala, only five or six have so far seriously considered the big move back to the mainland. However, the Guna’s problem is already critical enough that it would not be overly surprising if they all end up being forced to move in the coming decades, if global climate change becomes as serious a phenomenon as warned by many in the scientific community.

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The Guna Yala archipelago, also known as San Blas, is famous for its clear Caribbean seas and charming desert islands, which act as a magnet for tourists and holidaymakers. Photo courtesy of sanblaskunayala.com .

As a report by the NGO Minority Rights Group states, the Guna are regarded as one of the most politically organised of Panama’s indigenous groups, and they have a long history of resistance to and autonomy from both colonial-era Spanish invaders and the modern Panamanian state. Having gradually migrated from the mainland out to the Guna Yala islands, due to a variety of factors including conflict with other indigenous and Spanish communities, between 1925 and 1930 they engaged in a series of uprisings and rebellions against the Panamanian government, who had tried to force them to abandon their distinctive culture for a more ‘Hispanic’ one promoted by the modern Panamanian state.

They briefly established a Republic of Tule which sought to give the Guna a nation independent from the rest of Panama, but a subsequent peace treaty mediated by US officials led to a compromise whereby they would remain part of Panama but would enjoy a degree of autonomy over their territory and political organisation. This arrangement has remained to the present day, but having successfully resisted European colonisers and early-20th-Century military oppression, the Guna appear willing to accept defeat against the rising tides and may well be forced to take the next bold step towards a new chapter in their long and varied history.

 

https://eyeonlatinamerica.com/2014/09/04/panama-climate-change-island-indigenous-guna-yala/

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OPINION: Panama’s Climate Change Reality

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Since its foundation on February 27, 1852, the city of Colón has been A victim of fires and floods. The most recent catastrophes of its populations that are at sea level have been intensified by the phenomenon of climate change and the senseless destruction of mangroves and reefs that protected this community in a natural way.

What is happening should not be a surprise, the Panamanian scientist Stanley Heckadon has been publishing warnings since 1985.  But far from taking note, the absence of urban planning and government neglect have increased the vulnerability of Colon.

Climate change is a reality that our politicians and entrepreneurs want to ignore risking the viability of all coastal communities of the isthmus. If the destruction of the mangroves persists and the lack of planning, the tragedy of Colon will be repeated in other areas of the country. The State has the duty to rescue Colon and to undertake another management model for the Panamanian coasts that does not imply more tragedy for future generations …LA PRENSA Jan. 10

 

http://www.newsroompanama.com/news/panama/opinion-panamas-climate-change-reality

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Latin America’s First Climate Change Exodus

Posted on April 12, 2018 in Panama, Panama

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Some 1,450 Gunas from the San Blas island Cartí Sugdup, will become the first indigenous community in Latin America to be relocated because of climate change, according to the NGO  Displacement Solutions.

The Panamanian state resumed the relocation project in 2017, which began in 2010 reports La Prensa

The  Gunas will leave their traditional dwellings of walls of white cane and roof of pencas, on one of the largest islands in the Guna Yala Archipelago by 2019 to about 300 homes of 41 square meters and two bedrooms, with buildings s for cultural meetings of the tribe. The total cost will reach $10 million, according to the government.

the exodus is the first of the 40  inhabited islands in the regions 365 with a total indigenous population of  33,109 inhabitants, distributed in coastal lands and islets.

The accelerated increase in sea level caused by melting polar icecaps has already disappeared some white sand islands in what is seen as a paradisiacal archipelago.

The debate continues in other island communities, but in spite of climate change skeptics, the waters keep rising.

http://www.newsroompanama.com/environment/panama-3/latin-americas-first-climate-change-exodus

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The sinking of islands is not necessarily caused by climate change.  There is a group of islands not far from Australia where a new one regularly grows at one end of the chain and at the other end one sinks.  Of course, plate tectonics can be a tad complicated for the followers of the Church of Gore.

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1 hour ago, JohnF13 said:

 Of course, plate tectonics can be a tad complicated for the followers of the Church of Gore.

Are you saying that this is is the case in Guna Yala? Are shifting tectonic plates causing the island of Carti Sugdup to gradually disappear?

Edited by Keith Woolford
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Don’t know.  But, nothing is as it seems.  Rising sea levels - what is the basis for measurement?  Is it a stick at the entrance to some port or other or a bit more scientific?  There now seems to be an argument between scientists as to whether Arctic and Antarctic ice volumes are growing or shrinking.  The famed 97% consensus never was, it was a subset of a small group of warmists, promulgated by the IPCC. Land rises, land falls.  The problem is in the measurement.  If you say an island is being flooded due to rising seas, could the opposite not also be true - the land is sinking instead of the sea rising?  Nature is a complex thing.  Yes, there is climate change, BUT, there always has been.  CO2 emissions are a red herring, CO2 levels were much higher in medieval times - that wasn’t man made.

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Oh, I really have to back out of this subject.  Yes, climate change is real, it's called "weather".  It has changed many times over the life of the planet, from warm periods to ice ages.  Unfortunately, universities have debased themselves over the past few years to the extent that one really needs to question the truth of their preachings.  

That's it from me, don't want to engage this matter further.

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Business action on climate change “unpostponable”

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The “unpostponable” action of companies to mitigate the effects of climate change, should be considered as the first priority, “not an option”, because it is threatening the profitability of companies, said  a group of business experts in Panama on Wednesday, May 30

The problem was discussed at the celebration of the V Sustainability Forum “Profitability of business in the face of climate change, impact, solutions and opportunities”, held by the American Chamber of Commerce and Industry of Panama (AmCham).

The president of AmCham, Miguel Bolinaga, said that in addressing the risks created by climate change, “we feel we are contributing to the development of a more just, humane society, sensitive to issues that we cannot leave to discuss tomorrow.”

Gerardo Herrera, general director of Marsh’s advice for Latin America and the Caribbean, detailed a recent global report on risks caused by climate change, which measured the trends caused around biodiversity, the water crisis and “low perception that exists about digital risk.”

He emphasized that the “risk of corruption has grown exponentially” in Latin America, according to the study conducted by Marsh in partnership with another global risk measurement center and higher education entities.

The thirteenth study developed by Marsh stated that “the extreme climate appears as number one” in the concern for the productivity of companies and cited as an extreme example the ravages of hurricane María ten months ago on Puerto Rico, because  it was said that there were less than 100 deaths and today it is shown that there  were more than 4,000.

“That only shows that they did not want to see” the situation ” …and that happened in the United States,” he said ironically, adding that in 2018 there is in Latin America “greater awareness of biodiversity” and its impact on daily life.

Another effect of climate change is “involuntary migration”, added to “social instability”. “It’s a priority issue, not a future issue,” he said.

Everything has also been “complicated” with the expansion and diversification of the Internet in different platforms, which multiplies the cyber risk, and noted that the development of artificial intelligence should be on the agenda of all states so that “it does not create differences “between nations.

Steve Tochilin, general manager of Environment and sustainability of Delta Airline; Leonardo Veintemilla, Sales Manager of Maersk Lines; and Álvaro Uribe, from the Directorate of Urban Planning of Panama Metro, shared the actions they adopt in their daily work to mitigate the risk of climate change by seeking to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

This is due to the decrease in fuel consumption by the Maersk fleet, or Delta’s better use of airplane fuel and the solution by doubling the mass transit capacity of the Panama Metro.

The idea is to “eliminate the problems to accelerate world trade,” suppressing the use of paper in paperwork, and thus contribute to preserving forests, for example, Tochilin said.

The goal is to achieve by 2020 the reduction of 30 percent of CO2 emissions into the atmosphere.

Cities like the capital of Panama, that concentrates e half of the four million inhabitants of the country, should replicate the capacity of transport of passengers with a network of eight metro lines while it “reframes” the urbanization, at the moment “disconnected” because housing developments become walled.

All these realities impact the logistics development expected by a country because this is based “on interconnection,” Uribe said.

 

http://www.newsroompanama.com/environment/latin_america/business-action-on-climate-change-unpostponable

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Central America is the most affected region by climate change, experts say

Sat, 06/16/2018 - 17:57

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Experts in Honduras highlighted this Friday the efforts of the countries of the Americas against the effects of climate change and assured that Central America is the most affected region by the ravages of nature.

"America is one of the most effective regions in the activities it does on the challenge of climate change," Marcos Regis Da Silva, director of the Inter-American Institute for Global Change Research, told EFE.

He also said that he believes that America will achieve the goals of the Paris Agreement on climate change signed in 2015 by 193 states.

The agreements reached at the Paris Climate Summit in 2015 (COP21) set a maximum increase in the temperature of the planet at 2100, 1.5 degrees Celsius over pre-industrial levels.

Heavy rains, floods, excessive heat, and sudden changes in climate are some manifestations of global warming, said Da Silva, who noted that these phenomena are occurring "with more force and greater prolongation."

"The effects on ecosystems are making it more difficult to recover faster, then we enter a cycle where the effects are very negative and more difficult to have a recovery," explained the expert prior to participate in Tegucigalpa in a forum on challenges of global and climatic changes.

He emphasized that governments are making "maximum efforts" in line with the commitments of the Paris Agreement to achieve a "transition to green technologies" and for the populations to have "more knowledge" about the effects of climate change.

Da Silva stressed that Central America is one of the "most affected regions" by the effects of climate change, which are enlarged by local environmental factors, such as deforestation, so that the challenges of the Central American countries "are difficult."

However, the executive of the Inter-American Institute assured that Central America is making "very good efforts" to adapt and mitigate the effects of climate change.

Governments have "the obligation to reach the goals of the Paris Agreement and I think they are making maximum efforts to achieve it," he added.

He also stressed that the increase in temperature can affect the health of populations, agriculture and the economic survival of many regions.

The director of biodiversity of the Secretariat of Natural Resources and Environment of Honduras (MiAmbiente), René Soto, told EFE that his country is located in "not very privileged" geographical area  and "very vulnerable" to the effects of climate change.

Honduras is one of the countries in the world "most affected" by global warming caused by the impact that the industrial revolution had on the climate, he said.

Central America "is one of the most vulnerable areas" to the increase in temperatures, said Soto, who said that the Government of Honduras is promoting reforestation campaigns to combat climate change.

"The problem of climate change has worsened all over the planet," said the senior official, who said that this struggle "is shared" and highlighted the accompaniment on the subject of the European Union.

The Honduran official called on all sectors to "protect natural resources" and support reforestation campaigns.

 

http://www.panamatoday.com/international/central-america-most-affected-region-climate-change-experts-say-7089

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Millions march on climate change, Panama lags

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Posted 22/09/2019

While millions of students around the world skipped school on Friday, to participate in a global protest, to ask political leaders for concrete and immediate actions against global warming. Panama could only muster a few hundred in front of the National Assembly, a small fraction of those who answer the call from the pulpits when the churches wish to block the introduction of sexual education into Panama schools.

Students from major cities, from Sydney to Manila, from Seoul to Brussels, San Francisco and  Los Angeles, responded massively to the call launched by the 16-year-old  Swedish activist Greta Thunberg, who participated in a giant protest in New York where city authorities gave 1.1 million students the day off to participate.

In Panama, the politicians seemed unaware of the world event while a group of officials planned a jaunt to the US to drum up investment, while millions wondering whether there will be a world to invest in as the clock ticks down, will be watching a UN conference on climate change.

After listening to the young activists,  in New York, the UN Secretary-General, António Guterres, said that in reality the world leaders talk too much and listen too little. He could have been referring to the National Assembly.

The demonstrations began in Asia and the Pacific region, followed in Africa and Europe - with crowds in Paris, London, and Berlin - and ended in the United States.

While there is not yet an official figure, Thunberg is happy that 'Friday for the future', a movement he launched in 2018 with a banner in front of the Swedish parliament to demand actions against global warming, has summoned “millions”.

"The numbers are incredible, when you see the images, it's hard to believe," said the activist in New York City.  She hopes the activity "will be a turning point for society, to show how many people are involved. , how many people are pressing leaders, especially before the UN climate summit, ”she told the AFP news agency.

Organizers said protests were planned in 5,000 locations in 150 countries (including Panama). In Australia alone, more than 300. people participated. "This cannot go on like this. Our planet is coming to an end, ”said Bernie Waldman, 14, one of the thousands of students who protested in New York.

The rallies were the curtain-raiser to a week of events aimed at fighting global warming in New York, where the United Nations hosts the first youth summit for the weather and on Monday a climate summit with a hundred world leaders.  US President Donald Trump will not be one of them.

 

https://www.newsroompanama.com/environment/millions-march-on-climate-change-panama-lags

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ENVIRONMENT:  Climate change HQ  locating in Panama

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Posted 20/10/2019

Panama will become home to the world’ second headquarters of the Green Climate Fund in 2020

The fund  (GCF) was created in 2010 within the framework of the United Nations Convention on Climate Change, as a mechanism to assist developing countries in the implementation of practices of adaptation to climate change and mitigation of its effects.

Panamanian Vice Minister of Environment, Jorge Luis Acosta, said that the installation of the new headquarters of the Fund, which so far has one center " in South Korea, "makes Panama a global focus for the establishment of, The fact that its offices are in the country makes it easier for us to negotiate and monitor our projects," said the Panamanian vice minister.

According to the  Ministry, the headquarters of the Green Climate Fund will be ready, next year and located in the City of Knowledge, that already houses United Nations offices.

In March 2018, the executive director of the Green Climate Fund, Howard Bamsey, announced in Bogotá that the entity had approved about $350 million dollars for "climate financing" in Latin American countries.

"The board made the decision to approve almost 350 million dollars in climate financing for Latin American countries and that leverages more than a billion dollars in co-financing of other projects," said Bamsey

 

https://www.newsroompanama.com/environment/environment-climate-change-hq-locating-in-panama-1

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1 hour ago, Brundageba said:

Question will be who will be in charge of money management and financial oversight to prevent corruption.  Then, who will be in charge of watching the watchers  as millions and billions of dollars was mentioned .

The same people who have been administrating the fund for the last 10 years, I would imagine.

 https://www.greenclimate.fund/who-we-are/about-the-fund

The only thing new here is a presence in Panama.  I'm thinking the employment opportunities are good for the country.

 

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Panama missing from worldwide climate change protests

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Posted 30/11/2019

Hundreds of thousands of protesters calling for action against climate change gathered on streets in cities across the world on Friday, November 29 in advance of the UN summit in Madrid,  but there were no signs of support in Panama.

Some 630,000 people demonstrated in more than 500 cities in Germany, in the Fridays for Future movement inspired by the Swedish teenager Greta Thunberg,

With posters proclaiming "A planet, a struggle" or "We are on strike until you act," thousands of young people gathered at the iconic Brandenburg Gate in Berlin.

In Hamburg, 30,000 protesters sounded the alarm against global warming, and in Munich, there were about 17,000, according to police.

Other actions were also carried out in Europe, although lower than the last worldwide mobilization, in September.

People demonstrated in Madrid, where a 12-day United Nations climate meeting, COP25, will take place next week with dire reports on the future of the planet are expected.

The goal of the summit is to encourage governments to intensify their efforts in the fight against climate change.

In France, the militants concentrated their anger against the Black Friday sales, blocking Amazon distribution centers in Paris, Lyon and Lille.

koala.jpgThousands of young people gathered in Lisbon, where Greta Thunberg will arrive soon before traveling to Madrid for COP25.

In the United States, on a semi-festive day after Thanksgiving that was held on Thursday, activists gathered in the Capitol to hold a symbolic funeral.

The call was attended by actress Jane Fonda, who was arrested several times in recent weeks when she participated in climate change protests.

In Montreal, Canada, environmental associations demonstrated at the university where they distributed free used clothing to denounce the consumerism of Black Friday and its effects on the environment.

In Mexico, student groups returned to the streets with banners that said: "There is no planet B".

In, Sydney which kicked off the world demonstrations. The Australian metropolis was shrouded in a thick cloud of toxic smoke from the fires that ravage the eastern coast of the country.

Protesters gathered in front of the headquarters of the ruling conservative party accused of downplaying the threat of global warming. They waved banners that read "You burn our future" while chanting "We will rise."

Hundreds of forest fires devastated the states of New South Wales (Southeast) and Queensland

There were also protests in Tokyo, where thousands marched through the Shinjuku district.

"I feel a sense of crisis because almost nobody in Japan is interested" in climate change, said a 19-year-old student, Mio Ishida.

"I was very inspired by Greta's actions. I thought that if I didn't act now, it would be too late.."

In New Delhi, the world's most polluted capital, schoolchildren and university students, marched to the Ministry of Environment, carrying banners and chanting slogans demanding that the government declare a climate emergency.

India is one of the largest sources of greenhouse gases in the world and has 14 of the 15 most polluted cities on the planet, according to a United Nations study.

Last month, millions of people rallied around the world in response to a call for a climate strike.

 

https://www.newsroompanama.com/environment/panama-missing-from-worldwide-climate-change-protests

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600 watering holes to fight climate change drought

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Posted 15/12/2019

More than 600 watering holes have been built in different provinces of Panama as part of government preparations for the anticipated drought in summer 2020.

The province of Veraguas,  has 98, Coclé, 107, Herrera, 226, in Los Santos 16, Colón 30. Chepo 30 and Darién 25.

The Deputy Minister of Agricultural Development (MIDA), Carlo Rognoni, said: " since the start of the new administration, one of the priorities was to launch the Drought Plan at the national level to prepare the ground for the effects of climate change and avoid economic losses resulting from the death of livestock ."

The measure includes the construction of water troughs, drilling of wells, repair, and adaptation of dams and training of producers in cow nutrition.

The  projects have benefited 3,400  producers and a bovine population of 53,800

 

https://www.newsroompanama.com/environment/600-watering-holes-to-fight-climate-change-drought

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Panama gets $200 million towards  climate change  project

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Posted 05/02/2020

Panama’s participation in the Climate Change Summit of 2019, which took place in Madrid,  has resulted in technical assistance plans worth millions of dollars said the Ministry of the Environment (MiAmbiente) on Wednesday, February 5 during a presentation on the results of the December summit. Attended by delegates from 200 countries

One of the projects was achieved with Euroclimate, for $200 million, which will be invested in the modernization of national climate change policies.

The funds will also be used in the development of the draft framework law in Panama on climate change.

 

https://www.newsroompanama.com/environment/panama-gets-200-million-towards-climate-change-project

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  • Moderator_02 changed the title to Climate Change: Its Impact on Panama, Protest Activities, Establishment of Second HQ for Green Climate Fund, The UN's Convention on Climate Change

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