Seychelles signs landmark Paris Agreement on climate change |27 April 2016

Seychelles has joined the majority of the States Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change in signing the landmark Paris Agreement on climate change.

The agreement aims to enact policies to effect greenhouse gases emissions mitigation, adaptation and finance as from the year 2020.

A total of 176 countries including Seychelles have heeded the call of the United Nations secretary-general Ban Ki-moon, and signed this agreement which reaffirms the strong commitment of governments of the world to deliver on the promises made when the agreement was brokered in Paris in December 2015. The signing ceremony held in New York is but the first step towards the implementation of the agreements.

The agreement was signed by Ambassador Marie-Louise Potter, Permanent Representative of the Republic of Seychelles to the United Nations, on behalf of Seychelles Head of State James Alix Michel.

Individual countries must now complete internal ratification procedures before the agreement can come into force. To cement the Paris Agreement international policy on climate change, a minimum of 55 countries representing at least 55% of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions must ratify the Paris Agreement. Only then will the agreement be legally binding to all its signatories.

A communiqué from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs has indicated that Seychelles implores the rapid ratification by other countries to ensure implementation of this agreement commences swiftly. Seychelles is also calling on all other governments to take the challenge, to show continued political will and to fulfill the commitments to achieve the future that we want.

So far 15 countries have ratified this agreement, most of them Small Island Developing States (Sids) with low carbon footprint. They include Barbados, Belize, Fiji, Grenada, Maldives, Marshall Islands, Mauritius, Nauru, Palau, Palestine, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, Samoa and Tuvalu.