00:00To at least concretize one of us, please, we need to implement fully.
00:06I work a lot with the communities from the front line, and it's amazing.
00:12In all the countries that one has visited or has had some networking, the communities have adapted.
00:20But there is a limit to adoption.
00:22And you know, all the adaptation that we have been bringing forward is lost over and over again.
00:31Because globally, the shift from fossil fuel, the dependency on the conservative, traditional energy sources has been so, so slow.
00:42If you wonder why anyone with any logic would delay these, but that's what we have seen.
00:50And in the Global South, as already mentioned by our ambassador, that we are not responsible for the emissions.
00:58And yet, we are at the receiving end of most of the changes that has happened.
01:05So, during the discussions here, I mean, we looked at what has been achieved,
01:12and how our achievements in the area of adaptation constantly are being diluted or destroyed.
01:22And the West Asia crisis, the war and so on, has given us another awakening call.
01:31That if you keep depending on those resources and on those energy sources, then, you know, we are highly vulnerable.
01:39The negative effect, which is already actually quite covered, is because of the very high prices of gas and oil,
01:48it's going to really affect the plans and actions of our governments in terms of the coal phase-out.
01:55Not even just the phase-out.
01:57In terms of the stopping of the expansion of coal, which we thought we had already nearly won.
02:03You know, coal expansion has really slowed down in Southeast Asia, and even the rest of Asia.
02:11Even, you know, relatively in the past, even in the growth rate of coal production and consumption in China and
02:18India.
02:19But because of these high prices, we are afraid that the following things will happen, and it's actually happening already.
02:28One, is that they're going to lift the ban on expansion, and there will be fresh finance flows for new
02:35coal.
02:36Secondly, the plans for the phase-out will be redefined, and an even slower phase-out will be taking place.
02:48And then, of course, there's going to be a lot of justification for holding on to coal because of the
02:54impacts on the gas prices.
02:56But on the other hand, there's going to be, hopefully, a positive effect, and that is the even more clear
03:06necessity for the shift to renewables.
03:09And we're hoping that the latter will be more of the kind of response our governments will have.
03:15You mentioned the energy emergency declaration in the Philippines, and one of our concerns about this is it's kind of
03:25conflicting with what it's saying.
03:31It's saying that there's going to be a lot more commitment for the scale-up of RE, but there's also
03:37more lock-in to fossil fuels.
03:40So I think we need to challenge our governments to have a very clear and consistent response to this.
03:47And there cannot be any other response, but in the immediate and in the strategic, there has to be a
03:54scaling-up, a rapid scaling-up to renewables.
03:58This conflict is really emphasizing the vulnerability of economies that are dependent on fossil fuels,
04:06and especially economies that are dependent on imported fossil fuels, which is the great majority of our countries in Asia.
04:15Yeah, just to add, of course, in the short-term and immediate and short-term, as Liri said, the investments
04:21are going to go more into fossil fuels and more extraction.
04:25We're going to see or even delay of those targets.
04:28But we don't have to wait for the next term.
04:31We can actually start fixing the system now itself, and as Charles indicated, investments are already boosting,
04:37because we realize if we really want energy security and sovereignty, then we need to have those energy sources under
04:45our control.
04:46So how do we do that?
04:47We also know that the majority of the fossil fuel profits, especially in case of war, go back to the
04:53same 1% or 0.1% of those elites and those big corporations.
04:58And they make windfall profits.
05:01We have seen that in the war on Ukraine, and we are now seeing with the crisis happening in the
05:06Middle East.
05:07So when those profits are being made by the fossil fuel industry, we need to tax them now.
05:13That's what our governments need to do, and shift that money to strengthen the infrastructure for renewable energy.
05:21That can happen.
05:23This is the time that you have to upgrade your grids, because we realize that our grids are not really
05:28equipped to connect the renewable energy and have those systems in place.
05:34This is the time to also start investing in people for the skill of gradation that is required for the
05:40new and future economies and different energy transitions that we need.
05:45So this is the time to make sure that the money that is going to be generated from the fossil
05:50fuel profits goes in the right direction.
05:53So this should be a momentary or a very short-term further use of fossil fuels, but the long-term
06:00direction must be very clear.
06:02And in fact, this crisis has further underlined the point that if we really want energy security and sovereignty, then
06:09we have to rely more on renewables than imported fossil fuels.
06:13100% are transitioning away from fossil fuels.
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