 Good morning, good afternoon, good evening to all participants on the third day of this year's IDM. Before we start, I just would like to remind all that after the panelists of each panel, you'll have the possibility to use the Q&A function to raise the question or ask for the floor, as well as a raise of the hand function. Before we start with the first panel today, we will watch one small video, one more time to underline the importance of the migrant stories, something that all this IDM has, but this time, due to the virtual event that we are organizing, we'll actually show the movie. Under the campaign done by IMIDM, what is do-together, IM.ent where you can see a little bit more on those stories. This story is called Mila's story. Basically, we learn a little bit more on the Martian Iceland's problem on somebody who is on the front line and somebody who actually feel what climate change can do to the migrant. Please, go ahead with the video. My name is Mila Nó. I'm 13 years old and I live on Ligév Atoll in the Marshall Islands. My dream is to become a professional wrestler. I love my home so much because it is so beautiful. Everything in this place is good. I did not know what climate change meant. Then one day, some people came to our island on a yacht. They told me the seas are rising and one day Ligév might disappear under the water. That scared me and made me sad. At my family's house, we have a seawall to help protect us if the water rises. But I don't know if it will be strong enough. There is a marker in the sea at one end of Ligév. When the tide is out, you can see where the edge of the land used to be. Now it is under water most of the time because the sea has eaten the shore away. Sometimes the seawater washes into the wells and makes the water salty so we can't drink it. At our school, we have a machine that takes the salt out of the water. But we still have to be very careful how much water we use. Our teachers say the weather is hotter than when they were young. That is why we have so much drought now and it is much more difficult to grow fruit and vegetables. Me and the other children in Ligév love to play together, climbing trees and swimming in the lagoon. And we love the animals that live here. Some of my friends help raise turtles. They keep the baby safe from being washed away by the sea or killed by other animals till they are big enough to go back in the lagoon. Next year, I will have to leave Ligév to finish high school on the big island. Even though I love it here, I may have to stay away for a while if I want to do more studies and learn wrestling. But this is my home and I want to be able to come back one day. If it disappears under the sea, I don't know why. When I think about climate change, I know we all have to be strong and stand together. So the land is not destroyed and animals and people can always have somewhere to come home to. Now I would like to go to Florida today. Moderator, who is Mrs. Dina UNESCO, who is basically someone who is behind most of the work that we did in this year. IDM, Head of the Migration, Environment and Climate Change Unit within the IOM. Dina, Florida is yours. Yes, hello. Thank you so much, Diane. And thank you for kind words. And thank you for amazing collaboration to put this event together today. I'm very happy that we started with this video because our panel today will speak of different stakeholders approaches. And I think that kids are at the center of who the main stakeholders of all this discussion are today. And also the video we just saw, it's very important for us because it's part of the work we do with our fund, with IDF fund, that it's a key support to our work on capacity development and not only communication and beautiful image that say migrants voices, but beyond it really supporting our work. So I will do a short introduction for the panel and I will explain how the panel goes on and who our wonderful speakers are today. I want to greet absolutely everyone who is already online with us. As a first remark, I just wanted to take you two minutes back in the past. 70 years ago, IOM was born. It's a daughter of the Second World War and grew its first years in the Cold War. It's in 1990, so it took us 40 years to start looking into environment and climate change. And the trigger was the 1990 IPCC, so the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, first report that was really already sending signals that migration and climate change can be connected and we should care about that. And it seems then that IOM kicked off its action on this topic. 20 years ago, we are in 2001, the organization launched this international dialogue on migration. It's the oldest dialogue at multilateral level that exists. In 2001, the world was shocked by the fall of the Twin Towers. So here we are again 20 years after. 10 years ago, 2011, we organized an international dialogue on migration, environment and climate change, and 10 years more have passed. We are in 2021. We are also shocked by this pandemic that has taken the world over and had such an impact on migration. And we are here on Zoom, all of us, because of that. But in spite of Zoom being all Zoomed, we want energy for this panel. We want two key things. And before I give the floor to the panelists, we want to highlight two key messages just for today as we start the last day of our dialogue. And we start this session. First thing that we want to say is that we look very often at climate change and migration, at the tragic and displacement, and sad dimension of it. But we want also to make sure that we look at the positive outcomes of migration, the adaptive dimension of migration, and the contribution of migrants of diasporas to climate action and to sustainable development. This is one of the key objectives of our panel today to showcase solutions, to showcase voices and examples of what can be done. And the second key message, we are at the heart of what an international multilateral dialogue is about. It's about different voices bringing extremely different perspectives, and that's what our panel will do today. So for the panel today, I will introduce our speakers as we go ahead. But we have the chance to have a keynote speaker today. And the chance, the immense chance to have the Minister of Environment and Physical Planning of North Macedonia, Mr. Nasser Nuredini. We are extremely pleased to have you on. Because I think I understand you also have a migrant experience quite strong in your own life. But also because we saw that your excellence is you have key goals to drive really clean and green investments in the home region. And also to use your migration across border experience to bridge the differences between West and East and bring everyone together. And I also understood that you have a very strong passion from green economics. And this is at the heart of our discussion today. How do we connect this discussion on migration and displacement to green growth and what solution we can see? So we look forward to having your presentation today about the strong political engagement and the commitments from North Macedonia as much as the regional, global and national levels. So we look forward to this. I pass on the floor to you and give us energy. Thank you, Mr. Ionescu, the participants, their friends, their colleagues. First of all, thank you for actually giving us the opportunity of the Republic of North Macedonia to participate in this very interesting, so to speak, topic. And as the video so clearly stated, we're all in it together. It's not an individual issue we're facing here. To start off with, I think after watching that video, one can only emotionally be emotional about it and realize that we don't only need to do our part for our country and our region. We need to do our part for the whole world in this instance. As we all know, and you mentioned we've been zooming ourselves lately because of the COVID-19 pandemic, which has been a very unfortunate event. And we've all been caught off guard in this event. However, though, thankfully, we have the smartest people in the world working together for the first time to find a solution. And they have, we have a lot of vaccinations. We've got the rolling out, which will support hopefully us to overcome this climate change is something that has always impacted. The livelihood of the citizens. We've known about this over the last few decades, I would say. So the COVID-19 might have caught us off-guard, but climate change is not catching us off-guard. However, though, if we do not act now, we should have acted already. If we do not act now, we're going to further have issues of actually endangering the livelihoods of our citizens. We are a small country in the southern south-east of Europe in the western Balkans. We are a country which is developing, is going to work towards the EU accession. However, though, we're also very well aware that we are a country which is going to be impacted heavily by climate change. We already have, and as Mr UNESCO mentioned, I am a child who's been growing up abroad, coming back, etc. These were our challenges in the past were more economic challenges. Hence why we have a lot of migration, immigration from our country to other countries. As a country in itself, though, we are in the path of course of international migration. So let's just state one thing. A few years ago, we had over one million migrants passing through our country towards the developed countries of the EU. Now, in order to actually try and participate and do a contribute to the global issue, we as a country, of course, we revised our NDC to the Paris Agreement. We have taken a very bold decision to lower greenhouse gases by 51% compared to the 1990 levels by 2030, which is a net production of 82%. Now, this sounds bold and this sounds costly. However, though, one of the things that we all need to be aware of is the investments in green energy and renewable energy and sustainable development are actually a change of our own behavior. It means the changing of our consumer, the way we consume the products, what we consume. So these are actually costs. This will be actually a benefit and a profit, as we like to say. The investments we're making today will be a profit to our citizens, not only our citizens locally, but if everyone does their part, it will be a benefit to everybody in the whole world. As we know, what we do actually, of course, is in order to create, so to speak, the post-COVID-19 economic recovery, which will create a sustainable development and an inclusion as well of the socially vulnerable, vulnerable groups, not only in our country, but also the migrants who move to our country. And hopefully, maybe potentially entice our own citizens to move back to us is we're looking to create the green economic recovery. However, the green economic recovery sounds a bit mythic. However, if we look into the details, what we're saying is we want to invest in renewable energy. We want to invest in energy efficiency. So we have set up these funds. These are labor-intensive jobs. These are local products. This is going to support the local economy to kick-start. But it's not only about the economy. At the same time, we are going to be using less energy. A country like ours, which is unfortunately very heavily dependent on coal producing electricity through coal power plant, we need to move away from that. Hence, while we are committed to decarbonisation, we are actually going to go green. We're going to invest in solar, wind and hydro. What does this mean is the fact that this will be creating new jobs, new jobs for our own citizens here, as well as migrants that might move to this? Unfortunately, if we want to stop this, because we will have more migration in the world the whole time if the climate is changing, living conditions, especially for islands which are very susceptible to climate change, are going to become more and more difficult. I think it is our obligation, every single one of us globally to participate and minimise the effects, support the migrants. We're actually losing their livelihoods due to climate change, due to the economic developments of the developed countries. Thereby, I've also said this in other conferences to international colleagues of ours. It is not just us, the small countries, that needs to make these very ambitious dedication to climate change. There's also an obligation to the large developed countries to support the smaller developing countries and also large developing countries in order for them to actually become more sustainable. We all know that the developing countries have been developing over the last decades and decades. They've achieved a certain life standard and we should support the other developing countries now to achieve that same life standard through sustainable development. I also understand that there are also arguments for developing countries. If they have polluted in the past and achieved that standard, then we should be allowed as well. Hence why I think it's an obligation of all of us to support these areas, these countries, to develop in a sustainable way so that we can all make a change and minimise the effects of climate change. Thank you very much for the opportunity. I look forward to hearing from the other panelists. Thank you so much, Excellency, for this very realistic and encouraging speech. I would say that to have a minister speaking in the same speech about emotions and ambitions and the nationally determined contributions, it's a wonderful mix of how much we need both vision and heart and really concrete, very concrete commitments for this topic. Thank you also for highlighting the points on that countries now are, the majority of countries are home destination and transit countries and the challenges for small and medium and big countries all together joining in the same objectives. In fact, so thank you so much for bringing this vision into our panel today. As a next step, I will just very briefly mention the names of our speakers on the panel. We have five speakers and then each time I will introduce more specifically each panelist. So we have Dr. Ahmadudia from Senegal, who is a technical adviser at the Ministry for Foreign Affairs and of Senegalese abroad. We have Dr. Balgis Osman Elasha from the African Development Bank, where she's a chief climate change and green growth specialist. We have Ms. Enga Zettren, who is a senior business specialist at SCATEC in Norway. We do have also Mr. Irfan Oula Afridi, who is representing our youth and also advocacy voice with the United Nations major group for children and youth. And we have Mr. Belal Altine-Sau, who represents the voice of, let's say, also civil society migrants and also as an entrepreneur in the private sector, co-founder of the Seoul branch. Now I will give the floor to our next speaker who will speak in French, as far as I know, Dr. Ahmadudia, who is a technical adviser. So in this panel, we really try that you have and to hear different voices. So as a technical adviser of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Senegalese abroad, you are in charge of migration, climate change, soil degradation and environment. So that perfectly fits with our topic today. It's very important to also have your vision. So just also to understand how we can make the link with this contribution of diaspora and migrants in this fight against climate change. You have a very broad experience in sociology, demography. You've also worked in international organisations and you also support refugees and asylum seekers. So I'll give you the floor, Mr. Dia. So good morning, everyone. Thank you very much for inviting me. Thank you for willing to integrate the government of Senegal and also to thank your... and come back to the initiatives of the government of Senegal, but also to operate so that Senegal can be, of course, involved in the different international programmes. It's very important for us. So Senegal has to be involved in different approaches to have a better integration of migrants and to have them more involved related in the next environment, migration and climate change. So a lot of projects are around here, here for Western Africa. We have the PDD platform, which is a disaster management platform. It is a platform to include all the migrations in the local planning, including civil society, to show how important it is to see if this can be done and organised. So this should be organised as soon as possible to promote all our activities. So it's really crucial to consider the situation on the ground in Senegal, especially with regard to the climate work that is being done at the moment. We have one of our key cities that is really at risk of a severe climate change issue to do with rising sea levels. We need to therefore look at the adaptation of our coastal areas for climate change. We therefore are really looking at what we can do when it comes to our own coordination efforts. When I was studying at university, I looked at the English Channel and some of the coastal work that was being done on both sides, the English side and the French side. And I felt that I wanted to actually bring that expertise to bear within my own country, because we have some areas now that are really being swallowed up by the sea within the Senegalese coast. We're therefore looking at programmes that can be put in place now to really try to shore up our defences and to try to ensure that we can really work together with the various local authorities and regions to ensure that we can try to prepare for the future. Imagine now what the situation is when we are looking towards the future. We can perhaps try to really launch this multi-stakeholder process so that we can prepare to give those who are going to have to move the best possible assistance. This is linked to climate change and also what's happening in the Sahel region. We need to support our other governments within the African region that are really facing some serious issues now. Along our frontier regions, we're now trying to work in collaboration with Guinea-Bissau and with other important partners to try to really develop our own integrated approach to ensure that we can bring civil society organisations into work with us and work with migrant associations also on a national level. We really wish to place the emphasis on collaborative work now, working with all our various partners to see how different sectors can be integrated within our climate change work. Particularly with regards to the destruction of our land and the salinisation issue. We have a migration, development and governance project now at national level establishing these links and these synergies. It's very important for us to consider our various partners, particularly the EU, the Spanish government when it comes to identifying the needs of migrants that we're actually dealing with in our country and also those who are now finding their livelihoods threatened specifically to do with the fact that their land is getting increasingly less fertile. The Senegalese government have now succeeded in bringing in civil society organisations within our departments working for migration and also for climate change. We are working on our links with the private sector as well now, particularly in the national level but also within Senegal itself to try to really underline the importance of this nexus. I don't want to go over my speaking time today but I'd like to just say that I'm very happy to answer any questions that you have and once again thank you again for this opportunity today. Thank you. It's us that have to thank you Mr Dowell for this very interesting presentation and some very important messages recognising the voices of some of the most vulnerable countries when it comes to climate change is key. I think it's particularly important to emphasise the issue of salinisation and coastal defences that have an impact on human mobility. We have to really draw attention to good practices I feel with the various organisations, migrant organisations and others involved and this issue of the private sector is very important. This is perfect for our panel today because we're actually going to speak with representatives from the private sector. To our next speaker, I'm also extremely proud that we have Dr Balgis Osman Elasha with us. I think that I want to just to highlight from Dr Osman Elasha's background that she is a lead author, she was a lead author of the IPCC report and in particular one of the key most recent IPCC reports on climate change and land and that you were also in 2007 back in 2007 a name as a core recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize as a contributor to the IPCC. So this is an amazing I think experience and that you represented I think IPCC in Oslo which makes a nice transition also with our next speaker who is from Norway. I know that you are a forester by training and that today you represent in this dialogue as Chief of Climate Change and Green Growth Specialist and Regional Coordinator for North Africa Development and Business Delivery Centre the African Development Bank. So please go ahead and many thanks again. Many thanks for you for the introduction and thanks to the IOM for the invitation to this very important dialogue and the chance also to shed some light on what the bank is doing in relation to development and green growth. I will try to give, to shed light as I mentioned on these activities that have direct and indirect impact on migration in Africa for sustainable development in general. As you know the African Development Bank similar to other MDBs it has its objective of achieving sustainable development and further reduction and as such it addresses some of the main causes of migration also out of Africa and if we look at development simply as delivering services, well-being, contributing to well-being and improving the life quality we can appreciate the role of the bank and each of us to address these issues and also try to reduce any quality in Africa because these activities are trying to be across different African countries and across the different societies. So the issue of inequality as we know is one of the most important factors that contributes to poverty in Africa and Africa is also known as one of the world's most unequal regions. Income inequality is very evident in unequal access to resources and opportunities between rural and urban, between men and women and the bank is considering this issue seriously. That is why the long-term strategy of the bank 2013-2022 focuses on two main objectives inclusive growth and the transition to green growth. So it's one of the areas that I think it warrants real attention. In terms of migration within Africa it has always been an issue internal migration and external also out of migration and the problem with migration in Africa especially the internal where it's usually out of the production size to urban centers and without real skills without opportunities for getting involved in manufacturing or industries and instead the migrants are always being absorbed by the third sector and the informal activities which are by no means contributing to production. So this will aggravate the economic problems and poverty problems in the countries and the continents in general. So to overcome this problem Africa has to become more industrialized and to improve its production capabilities as well as productivity in the natural, human, physical and other capitals and in contribution to address this gap and to achieve profound transformation of Africa's economy and to unlock the potential of its citizens the bank identified five key priority areas what we call high fives the high fives that is feeding Africa through improved agriculture and agro industries, powering and lighting Africa industrialized Africa, integrated Africa that is promotion of regional integration and improve the quality of the life of Africans especially poor women and young people and to achieve lasting change for Africa we need to focus on the use of course as Africa continues to be like the continent with the most number of views globally the use in Africa represents more than 60% and also globally the number will be up to maybe one third by 2050 of the global use in Africa. But probably with that African youth are also scavenging poverty through migration and poverty because of many factors some of them are related to climate change others are related to unemployment opportunities so out of the 10 billion youth that enters the labour market in Africa each year only 3 million get strong that means 66% are not employed they are not contributing to economic activities and they were left with no option to migrate that is why migration turned to Europe is still like embarrassing for Europe and for Africa and the bank identified that the lack of employment opportunities for African youth is one of the most critical policy challenges of our time and so the bank developed the jobs for youth in Africa strategy the strategy selected free flagship program as a priority areas is agriculture industrialization and ICT and based on this it launched an initiative jobs for youth in Africa this initiative target to keep more than 50 million youth with employable skills and create 25 million jobs in agriculture ICTs and other related industries the bank will work through this initiative to help mobilize 3 billion 3 billion US dollar to support the young entrepreneurs in Africa focusing on business incubation and it will facilitate the establishment of skills enhancement zone this is an enhancement zone that will foster better linkages between skills and industrial development some examples of these programs are in agriculture for example we've been borrowing noble agribusiness led enrollment abbreviated as enable youth it aims to help African men and women to incubate and scale up their agribusiness as of now the program is implemented in 11 countries across Africa and there are room for more it's a total investment of around almost 900 million US dollars also the program is supporting the IFT center of excellence in Kigali this is a joint initiative to the Kigali Institute of Science and Technology and Canadian University so the bank provided like 40 million US dollar support and to have like a second generation of computer experts in Africa the bank also supports the establishment of digital technology parks in Senegal coming to the issue of climate change and green growth and we know that climate change is a threat multiple layer for Africa it is Africa considered as one of the most vulnerable continents so the banks put as main objective to ensure climate resilience and low carbon development in Africa and to facilitate the implementation of this objective the bank developed tools and methods and strategies that will safeguard its investments and also climate proof the project portfolio in this regard the bank invented concrete actions through the promotion of land, use management, smart agriculture water resource management, resilient infrastructure and urban systems also the bank financed the proportion of climate finance in the bank portfolio kept increasing from 9% of the total portfolio in 2016 to 36% by 2019 and now the aim is to have 40% of the portfolio labeled as climate finance by the end of this year 2021 in addition the bank committed to provide 25 billion in climate finance by 2025 the bank is helping the regional member countries access climate finance to implement their national determined contributions and other climate change strategies so the bank gets accredited to the regional implementing entity for most of the global funds including the green climate fund the climate investment fund, the Jeff moreover the bank established critical internal finance support mechanism to address issues related to climate information that is the Klim Davis special fund adaptation in Africa Africa climate change fund, SCCF Africa water facility Africa crime climate smart agriculture program the desert to power program and others so these are internal funds within the bank also the bank continues to develop new climate funds targeting different sectors like forestry, agriculture, the private sector and our partners are very supportive in this regard like now we have the Canada AFDB climate finance facility and the Africa circular economy multi-donor trust fund supported by Finland and Nordic Development Fund so the bank in house now is developing an initiative that is the NDC hub which is established to support the regional member countries implement their NDCs it is like a platform where partner institutions coordinate the climate change support interventions to deliver actions in a very coordinated and efficient way for women there is a dedicated fund for African women that is affirmative finance action for women in Africa abbreviated AFDB this is an initiative to mobilize 5 billion in new financing to support women business in Africa so today the bank is... this is the last sentence there are 24 financial institutions in 15 countries and within this is our program and it is expected to expand by 2020-22 thank you thank you so much I don't know there was an intervention but it was at the end of the time so that was helpful thank you so much for bringing this very complete intervention to this panel I would just highlight as a key point I think how you started on the question of inequality which is key question on the multi-causality of migration and how difficult it is also for us to just isolate the environmental and climate dimensions from everything else that's development, conflict, education, demography the wide range of questions we are facing when we discuss this topic and also thank you for highlighting the gender dimensions and thank you so much for giving all these wide range of different initiatives that are such a variety of initiatives and of bringing also to our attention the key question of the climate funds and of the access to climate funds and the difficulty we have still to have projects with a migration dimension being funded by the climate funds that's absolutely key as well thank you so much I will pass now to our next speaker we have three more speakers on this panel so now it's really my pleasure to have Miss Enya Sethren I hope it's well pronounced in Norwegian it's very difficult who represents for us today the vision of the private sector from our partner SCATEC you have also an amazing background and I must say as a senior business development analyst in SCATEC now you work really towards increasing the access to renewable energy in developing countries and we have also including collaboration with IOM on the solarization of the Malacal humanitarian hub you are in this private sector focusing on operating renewable power plants globally worldwide but with a true focus on developing countries and you have yourself also a whole background on refugee questions humanitarian you work with the foreign affairs you work with the world food program you have amazing experience so I stop introducing you and I let you speak you have also seven minutes thank you so much Enya for being with us thanks so much Enya for that kind of introduction and first of all it's very inspiring to hear about the green ambitions of both North Macedonia, Senegal and the AFTB let me just start by putting SCATEC on the map for you so SCATEC is a global renewable energy business that develops, builds, operates and owns renewable energy projects across technologies in developing countries as you rightly put Enya and what we do is becoming increasingly important around 800 million people do not have access to electricity globally of which 650 million people live in Africa and for displaced people the numbers are especially striking and limited access to energy is also huge impediments also for other development indicators such as protection education and jobs and with displaced populations already being vulnerable on all of these indicators lack of access to energy serves to reinforce pre-existing vulnerabilities and hinder development and reintegration energy needs in OCD countries are expected to increase by more than 80% by 2050 so if we are to reach the goals of the Paris Agreement it will thus be immensely important what choices we make today in order to reach tomorrow's energy needs and renewable energy needs to be at the cornerstone of that transition but despite the crucial role of energy in humanitarian action and commitments to carbon neutrality the green transition in the humanitarian sector has been a slow coming process the humanitarian agencies spend more than a billion USD on polluting fuel every year and with the protracted crisis across the globe fueling humanitarian aid can often consume a quite substantial part of the humanitarian budget and apart from the obvious negative climate and cost effects the diesel generators have not even been able to provide a secure and stable access to energy often hampered by power supply risks or fuel disruption so in order to meet the goals of the Paris Agreement and reaching both net zero increased electrification globally and the STGs we have to embark on a massive scale up of renewable energy and the humanitarian sector must be part of that transition and we are ready, I mean the technology is mature and cost saving and we have also designed a model that specifically targets the needs and the procurement needs of humanitarian actors and tries to address the bottlenecks that until today has hindered private sector collaboration for providing green energy to displaced populations and our solution is release and I'll tell you why replacing fuel with solar and battery will both reduce emissions save cost and ensure a reliable power supply so release is a preassembled, containerized, movable and modular solar and energy storage system for rent which then connects to the existing diesel generators to replace diesel and electricity mix and the key added value here is flexibility and simplicity so being conscious of the budget structures in for instance the UN system contract ratios are flexible down to one year within the option of either prolonging the contract or buying the assets at the end of the contract and should the humanitarian activities in the area come to an end well then the contract can also be terminated so short term contracts, limited upfront payments serves to reduce the buyer's financial commitment both on the guarantee side and on the balance sheet and it's a needed cost saving both compared to conventional solar in the same time perspective but not least compared to diesel so really making it easier for humanitarian agencies to embark on the green shift and using batteries also addresses the power supply risks experienced with diesel generators making the system stable and operable and enabling delivery of solar power 24-7 the system can be scaled up or down at any time depending on the need it's quick to deploy the plan can be up and running like six months after contract is signed and it can be redeployed and that fact that this mobility factor also limits the environmental impact in preventing any permanent occupation of land which is a key factor so I often say that release makes solar simple because you have a simplified structure with one contract only it's really like a plug and place solution where the equipment comes pre-assembled in containers SCOTIC installs the equipment at the side and monitors the performance 24-7 and then we also train the humanitarian staff in local offices for maintenance which also support knowledge transfer and capacity building so we have several relief projects in our portfolio around 300 megawatts and what is remarkable here is that many private sector companies for example mining companies have shown a great appetite for the release concept driven by increased pressure to reduce your carbon footprint but ironically we haven't really seen the same sense of urgency in the humanitarian system but last year as Zina mentioned we commissioned our first release project with the humanitarian actor a combined solar and battery storage plant in South Sudan with IOM which heads the humanitarian hub in Molokal and that plant has a PV capacity of 0.7 megawatt solar combined with 1.4 megawatt hour battery energy storage system then is that connected to IOMs existing diesel generators and what's amazing about this project is that it reduces annual CO2 emissions by 80 to 90% by covering 90% of the energy needs with solar power and it's cheaper giving reduced energy costs of around 20% and it provides a more reliable and robust energy supply than diesel so it's like a no-brainer and the good thing is also that the release model can also be a driver for local development with the potential to expand and deliver energy to health centres, to schools and to other community services knowing that namely unstable and costly access to electricity is a huge impediment for effective service delivery in rural areas particularly so the humanitarian agency would then act as the anchor client on the ground and then with the possibility to connect to the local grid in a second phase so that has a clear local development effect in both strengthening government-led service delivery and also with the handover of permanent energy infrastructure to the municipality after 10 to 15 years so to wrap this up the negative secondary effects of the COVID-19 pandemic have made displaced populations even more vulnerable reinforcing the pertinence of the nexus between migration and climate change but crisis also provides a momentum to make a change, to build back better and greener and it's time for the humanitarian agencies to start and monitor energy use to set emission reduction targets and incorporate with renewable energy suppliers and I think also donors setting clear requirements to reduce fuel costs and emissions and DFI is playing an important role in providing financing and guarantee structures all of that can also help sort of spark that change but I think the key message for me today is that we have a ready-made solution that really responds to the responsibility that we all bear now as renewable energy has become the most cost-effective alternative in giving populations in remote locations access to green energy and we're very eager to discuss with you today and also onwards how we together can contribute to spur that green shift in displacement settings Thank you, I think that was all Thank you so much dear and yes, Edrin for your presentation today I think you brought to our attention the key question of access to energy of displaced population in camps or not in camps setting and also the key question of our own impacts of our own operation on the environment and in particular I think the very strong awareness that has happened over the past two years on the humanitarian side to better factor in green solutions and clean energy in the humanitarian response so this is absolutely key and also thank you for highlighting the importance of innovative partnerships with the private sector and the UN and all the organization and that solutions are already there and that's very important Thank you so much I will pass now to our next speaker we have two more speakers in my list so I would like to introduce now Mr Irfan Oula Afridi who has the amazing task to represent somehow the youth you are at the United Nations major group for children and youth a regional focal point for south and central Asia and I know you are also a humanitarian and DRR practitioner researcher with the United Nations University with the Institute for Environment and Human Security so the floor is to you Thank you so much Dina for the introduction and for having me so before going to my presentation I would like to kind of share some recent figures so if we see the past year 2020 so the disaster which are caused by climate change caused more internal displacement than war in 2020 so especially if we talk about the natural hazards so intense storm and flood and trigger three times more displacement than violent conflict did last year and which lead to 55 million internally displaced people by the end of last year according to the figure published by IDMC and according to the refugees organization 30 million new displacement last year due to floods, storm and wildfire so which is somehow clearly showing highlighting the impact of climate change so whenever disaster occur young people or children are found to be present or thought of the victim of disasters and youth are not just passive victim but youth can react more flexibly and resiliently to dramatic changes as compared to adults and despite that young people can play an important role in protecting and improving the environment so they can change their life style which can have positive impact in the environment so they can also make their homes schools and youth organization more environment friendly environment friendly practices like recycling of different material as well as preserving resources such as water and electricity so engaging youth in environmental protection not only create tiring effect on changing youth behavior in attitudes but possibly influence their parents relatives and family so we have already seen around the globe the two are already in the forefront of fight against climate change and COVID-19 and the youth are resourced in climate change adaptation and sustainable development but they can be burdened for the country for the nation if they are left unprepared and excluded from the different activities especially if you talk about climate change adaptation and disaster risk reduction are sustainable development activities and research have shown that youth participation in climate change adaptation and sustainable development can help them learn topic that positively impact their lives while acquiring the practical experiences that support them to become a better leader in the future so if we talk about the youth expertise and the youth innovative ideas so they have quite a lot of experience and they have already shown so the youth can offer innovative solution to climate change adaptation and sustainable development in their action and community can help reduce the impact of climate change but unfortunately however in many countries youth contribution and youth engagement and community and climate change adaptation and sustainability development activities are below the desired standard so if we talk about the nature based livelihood and the youth participation and the migrant participation so there is a range of nature based livelihood that exist and can help address the crisis in the nature and climate on one hand while also creating prosperity on the other hand so those livelihoods may be restoring forest building green infrastructure protecting mangroves practicing agroecology and planting urban forest also the rain gardens upstream in urban wetlands spawn green rooftop green sidewalk and concept like spawn city which the youth can be an integral part of it so the practical and implementable natural based solution can protect and enhance nature while also will create will create a sustain and enhance decent employment and contribute to the achievement of sustainable development but the most important thing is while planning and decision making process the youth should be in the heart of all those mentioned activities so if we talk about the youth challenges so there is some challenges for youth participation and for youth leadership which are institutional and it's include proper platform where youth can come can exchange their ideas and can somehow give the practical shape to the innovative either way they really want to implement and there is also capacity building less of capacity building issues and especially if you talk about awareness in education climate change adaptation so there is also a lot need to be work to build the capacity of youth and the most important youth recognition is a key contributor and other challenges also include tokenism and sufficient transparency in many countries and bureaucracy in many countries are preventing the youth to come and to play the role which they want to play so institutionalizing many youth engagement and increasing coordination between the different organization working with youth in also climate change adaptation and disaster restriction most important investment on youth especially on your education and capacity building and access to the finance could be the possible solution to enhance youth participation and sustainable youth participation and climate change adaptation and sustainable development so to wrap up today displacement crisis arise from many interconnected ficture including climate and environment change conflict and political instability so the world has been made more fragile by the COVID-19 pandemic and sustained political will and investment and locally on solution will be more important than ever so if we talk about to build for our better and greener so youth should be put at the heart of the greener COVID recovery and as rightly said in the video in the beginning do the right thing so let's come together so let's work together and working in the silos will not work anymore thank you thank you so much for your intervention it shows the amazing richness of migration experience in particular for youth and children in the positive and the negative and the inclusion the exclusion issues and how much use it's the driver for change the driver for climate action we see this at the cops I look forward to cop for the youth intervention most of the times I think it's the strongest voice coming up you mentioned also the challenges of bureaucracies and youth are the future leaders so it's also about how you see the way they can advance and and be included and contribute to to the sustainable development so thank you so much for your intervention this was great and now I will pass to the last speaker I'm now going to move into French because we're very lucky to now have the other side of the coin represented the private sector we've had a Senegalese representative already and now we've actually got an entrepreneur from Senegal the voice of migrants as well and the diaspora so we're very happy to now be hearing from Mr Belal Altineso who is our last voice on our panel today and you have spent a lot of time in the United States and now you have returned to Senegal and you are really pushing for the emergence of agroecology you're passionate about agriculture and it's important if I've understood correctly and you have founded your own agroecological farm called Sao Ranch with an association with young Senegalese women so it's an extremely exciting story I think and I'm going to now pass you the floor thank you thank you very much so I'd like to say good afternoon to everybody I'm honoured to be here today my name is Belal Altineso I'm 53 I am Senegalese and I've returned to my country as you say and I'm really passionate about agroecology what I would like to say is that the planet that we all share is now at a critical point so we have seen a lot of waste, a lot of destruction and a lot of indifference and the planet is now suffering because of this there's a lot of destruction and change going on and we are really feeling the effects now of climate change and catastrophes, natural disasters and increase in poverty as well we see movements of people particularly young people from rural areas to the towns this is happening a lot in our country at the moment and they find themselves often unemployed and in very difficult circumstances so it's very important I think to look at how we can tackle this and how we can really find solutions to the problem we know that this is going to concern all of us of course we know that certain countries are particularly affected but the whole world is going to feel the knock on effects and we need long lasting solutions now we need to safeguard the planet for future generations and it needs a global approach the action however needs to be on a local level first and foremost and this is now linked to my own project I went to the United States as we've said and I have come back to Africa now to Senegal I've come back to my roots I've come back to my homeland to actually try to bring in solutions on a local level for communities that have been really affected by poverty and clandestine immigration I am a small farmer I studied in Morocco as well and I have been able to try to actually establish links and I founded my own Sao Ranch so the idea is to really try to place the emphasis on ecological agriculture so taking into account preservation of the land recycling and community solidarity for good practices and for autonomous land ownership and management there are 14 individuals now involved with their own cultivation areas and we are really trying to involve our community in this transformative approach really try to draw upon interaction the idea is to not use pesticides or fertilizers chemicals and to really try to work in an environmentally friendly way to place the emphasis on preservation we wish to create decent work for people on a local level we want to ensure that we can also train others to learn these procedures we have already trained or worked with around 500 young people since 2015 so these young people have been trained in different agricultural professions around 150 of these individuals are returning migrants so we really do feel that we are training the people we are going to really be great models in the future so we call this the agroecological immersion centre our training centre it's a great initiative but I don't think it's enough yet I think we really need to have an even more inclusive partnership we need to really try to scale up our training as well and scale up our linkages with other organizations to try to establish more of a rapport with communities and with other organizations it's important to continue our awareness raising work I think this is crucial to really crown our successes and our efforts young people must be involved they must be able to have possibilities and opportunities to develop their own initiatives they must be given local development opportunities and this must be with a view to trying to avoid people leaving as clandestine immigrants local authorities, local communities must work in synergy with young people to really look at long lasting local impacts it's very important I think to really place the emphasis on young people and to follow up on these trajectories over time as well we have to really try therefore to make sure that those who are going to continue to work the land into the future have the skills and have the possibility of making their livelihoods sustainable we need sustainable solutions we need to make sure that these solutions will be safeguarded for generations to come these future generations really need to have respect for their lands they really need to know how to treat it well soil is a key issue we've seen so much soil erosion and saliff and we have to therefore try to spread environmental knowledge on this issue and ensure that young people and young farmers can follow good examples in their practices we've looked at soil contamination as a key issue and been working on trying to neutralize this trying to tackle this we feel that we can really be effective when it comes to breaking down barriers as well if we work in this approach if we try to really place the emphasis on awareness raising and that link between climate change and poverty and livelihoods I feel this should be a way forward to create green employment we need to try to really reason and think better about how our agricultural industries are working try to rethink our food systems so that we can filter this down to the most local level but create synergies also between countries this huge difference between the need to be overcome we need to create more partnerships on all the levels all communities are humans all communities share human concerns and all communities share our planet we all need to be able to work in symbiosis therefore and we all need to work on sustainable development so that Africans can find its way forward for the future so that this clandestine immigration ends this is crucial and this is what I wanted to say to you today thank you thank you very much for making this very passionate link between long lasting sustainable agriculture entrepreneurship and migratory risks how can we reduce the risk of forced and clandestine immigration through these kinds of initiatives alternatives placing the emphasis on this local dimension we're going to talk about this in the next panel actually so it's quite a good segue I think now we get our panelist presentation we spoke of the past we spoke of the present and we spoke of the future we spoke of values and we spoke really of solution very concrete solutions and I open now the discussion also to the floor I saw a number of questions for taking the floor so I will start with the ones I received and go through them so I have first a request from our deputy permanent representative of Ecuador Mr Alejandro Davalos the floor is yours well thank you very much Mayor Moderator thank all panelists for their valuable presentations climate change effectively aggravates all the threats that motivate people displacement increases poverty and also intensifies the pressure on our resources as well the possibility of conflicts and violence therefore we need to take urgent measures to include migration and climate change adaptation and mitigation in our debate to this end we need to strengthen mandatory policies both at national and international level as well as strengthening cooperation especially regarding climate financing we had to ensure that all strategies against climate change and climate change actions people and people mobility in mind therefore the global compact for a safe order and regular migration is a key framework that would allow us to optimize the benefits of migration as well as address the risk and challenges presented by climate change and natural disaster the compact gathers the need to prioritize mitigation adaptation as well as resilience resilience against climate change in all those countries of origin as well as minimizing any adverse factors that force people to migrate the compact also acknowledges the fact that in situ adaptation is not always possible and there was we had to proceed to plan reallocations and foster regular migration we had to work towards improving our agreement and understanding of the link between climate change and migration and intensify and identify our actions and specific tools that we can use for their dissemination we also had to strengthen cooperation as well as financial climate financing in order to include people in our answers to climate change having expertise and technical assistance that are key to develop the capacities necessary to respond to displacement and migratory photos related to climate change as well as the creation of infrastructure as well as the allocation of resources necessary to answer to this cooperation is key so we can ensure that migrants are part of our green transition and this way all states can build more sustainable development and include human mobility in its process thank you very much thank you very much well thank you very much Mr. Davelas I have a next request from the floor from director of foreign consular services from Venezuela they are just connecting I'm bringing them on one moment and it's Mr. Elvediz Almeida sorry good morning good evening can you hear me? yes we can so in this very important forum for international dialogue on migration environment and climate change I would like to celebrate this initiative and extend the greetings of our constitutional president Mr. Maduro and Jorge Riasio our ministry for foreign affairs we want to thank the IOM for creating such spaces for debate I would also like to thank all panelists for their contributions to this debate that allow us to consider topics of key importance for our world so we can better use opportunities to include migrants and displaced people in our policies the Republic of Venezuela understands and acknowledges the need to include the Venezuelan people in our actions against climate change we have taken already measures and steps towards this end however we understand that this topic has not been included in the general debate in our societies and it's only the realm of ecological and environmental movements so acknowledging the existence of climate change and its direct impact on human activity is key towards a more effective decision making and creation of policies considering the social financial and human dimension of the issue therefore the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela is always keeping ahead of the debate and willing to address climate change and its impact on its population understanding that it is an element that has a permanent effect on our country education at all levels and it's all and all forms is key to understand that climate change is an ongoing process that has ongoing and lasting impact on migration and it can give way to significant transformations both in our country and in the world as well as altering the current economic systems Venezuela with its institutions includes the youngest sectors in our country so we can promote and foster a green revolution that has our planet our Pacha Mama at its core that addresses climate change and its consequences as well as the physical manifestation of its impact together with initiatives for its mitigation and adaptation thank you very much thank you Mr. Almeida I have a third request from the floor I'm very pleased to have Mr. John Bingham from the NGO Committee on Migration Hi John, you are in New York I think now so please go ahead thanks very much I'm representing the NGO Committee on Migration where one of the top priorities of this global coalition of national, regional and international civil society actors on the ground is a responses for migrants and migration and climate change context so thank you very much to IOM and the speakers thank you Dina for really a fine panel and moderation just maybe three minutes maximum maybe two and a half concretely as you said Dina so well at the beginning give us energy you said to the minister from North Macedonia and I think that's what migrants do when you added that it's important to talk not just of migrants forced to move but migrants who move with their talent and their energy and their passion and their skills and their hard work and their innovation that's the experience of migrants who cross international borders because of climate change and environmental degradation so they have it in the bones awareness of the problem and in the bones commitment very often and energy to try and change things for the better so quickly two concrete examples one in countries of origin contributions to countries of origin and I'll follow happily the speaker from Senegal from South Ranch a few minutes ago and one at analogy contributions that migrants bring to countries where they live so the contributions that are made by earnings that migrants send home as remittances for survival for resilience for adaptation for reconstruction about a week ago the world bank announced the latest figures of close to three quarters of a trillion dollars US dollars of earnings migrants send to their countries of origin most of them to countries that are in developing situations many of them in countries that have suffered climate change and environmental degradation in Central America in Haiti in the Philippines and so on so that contribution that migrants in countries of destination send back to countries of origin and of course as Mr. Sao said in others the aspera and migrants who return with skills to countries adapt or be resilient among other things and second concrete example the contribution of migrants make in the countries where they live the countries to which they've moved and analogy right out of today's headlines in today's hopes the COVID vaccines the two most popular and effective COVID vaccines worldwide were created by companies in Germany and in the US founded by migrants founded by migrants Turkish migrants to Germany German migrants to the US French migrants running one of the companies in the US so migrants bring as UNHCR like to say much more than just the bags on their back and what they can carry they bring what's needed and they do so in context of climate forced displacement so to finish you know this international dialogue on migration always so smart and timely from IOM it's actually talking about two types of climate change one the rough the bad the unwanted climate change where the environment is is ruined and people have to leave but the other type of climate change is one we actually need and that's a climate change that recognizes the importance of migrants to the whole world as the minister from North Macedonia said not just to one country not just to one region but to the whole world and what they bring that makes a contribution and that's the kind of climate change we need to fight the other one channels for people to move channels for people to work channels for people to contribute their energy and their passion and their skill and a lived experience thanks thank you so much John for speaking of of remittances and more broadly about the contribution of migrants I think this is a key message from our side also for this IDM and I have one more request and then a question as well so I give now the floor to Uruguay to miss Alejandra Costa thank you Dina yeah yeah we can hear you thank you very much Dina I simply wanted to make an intervention on the name of my country and express our gratitude for being able to take part in such an important dialogue about migration, environment change, we know that climate change has complex and diverse effects and impacts and face to these we had to analyze and categorize those future effects in order to make an effective and adequate decision making in the case of Uruguay the largest impact are the flats resulting from river flow that has led to the evacuation of entire populations and they need to provide them with food shelter as well as healthcare as facing the financial and economic consequences of said displacement therefore Uruguay together with many of the countries that are joining these efforts have been working towards the mitigation of vulnerabilities and the building of resilience and climatic response addressing the root causes of these displacements and creating the necessary elements to respond to crisis when they occur I know that it goes without saying that those at greater risk are usually those who are more vulnerable therefore Uruguay's migratory regulations are one of the instruments that we use to address these migratory movements the cornerstone of the countries migratory regulations is the coordination of all countries so we can address migratory flows when they occur after these we proceed granting all arrivals access to healthcare and education in our country we have also made significant progress in recent years to mitigate risk and adapt to climate change by reducing vulnerability as well as the effects and consequences posed by internal and external displacements so in recent years in our work related to migration climate change displacement our environment is always on the table we cannot ignore what is going on by gathering this information as well as empirical observations we are able to understand the situation and from this understanding try to pay possible consequences and work towards building greater resilience capacity build capacities and make use of the technology available working jointly in the development and implementation of policies that based on scientific evidence and always in line with human rights can help and address the situation of migrants thank you very much thank you very much I would like to really highlight and thank Venezuela and Uruguay for the last interventions that really bring your region also into the discussion very strongly and highlight how vulnerable the region is and how many original and innovative policy and practice options are put in place in each of your countries I have one extra demand now from a completely different region of the world from the Philippines from Mr. Albert Maralang the floor is yours thank you very much Madam moderator for giving me this opportunity to share the Philippine views on how to develop multi-stack holder approaches and which would include other projects especially the private sector and also to how to ensure that there will be support for the inclusion of migrants to build a sustainable future Madam Chair thank you once again especially to the IOWM organizers and to the panelists of today's session and once again thank you for the opportunity for giving the Philippines this time to share our thinking on multi-stack holder collaborations to ensure that migrants are provided opportunities to be productive and self-sufficient despite being severely affected by climate change environmental catastrophes climate drivers like conflicts so the coming together of various groups for purposes of producing a multi-sectoral outcome that addresses unintended impacts like migration this generates optimism that despite external threats like climate change and environmental upheavals humanity can still surmount unimaginable difficulties and be inclusive as well and at the same time in streaming migrant groups who have been excluded and bringing them back into the fold you ask us however how we can actually do this when migrants have just been uprooted and are in an unfamiliar territory which would appear threatening our response to that is migrants who have been dislocated from their homes and livelihood bases by environmental events like climate-induced disasters normally find comfort in being integrated and being streamed into familiar surroundings as they came from communities which were dependent on the physical environment for well-being they most likely will find comfort in being involved in nature-based interventions which enable them to gradually heal and become productive again it only takes a little push and a modest amount of support to facilitate their reintegration into mainstream society whether in land or water undertakings involving migrants in nature-based undertakings we think is the fastest way to heal from trauma Leslie Madam Chair migrants have their own unique contribution to recovery and redevelopment in the aftermath of disasters so they must not be treated as outcasts but mainstreamed into society as soon as possible in fact they should constitute a recovery plan saying that they are almost everywhere and most of them form part of the regular working force in almost all countries and Leslie Madam Chair this mainstream consideration and treatment of migrants is as true for any natural hazard event as for human-induced ones that create displacement like the COVID-19 pandemic overall the biggest resource for recovery are people of which migrants normally comprise a considerable portion thank you very much Madam Chair Thank you so much for speaking for the Philippines we are coming to the end of the panel I have one very specific question that I think will send also particularly to Mr. So from a participant from Martin Clifford a specific soil and water conservation question and I think a question whether this can be also replicated in other contexts we don't have no time if we want to move on to the next panel what I will do now is just to give back to the panelists 30 seconds for a key message to close the panel each of you and I will start then with Mr. So and then we'll pass you on the question more specifically so you can continue because I think it would be a very important and quite detailed response so back to you just for 30 seconds of a closing remark Yes thank you very much this debate has been extremely interesting everybody's opinion has been so significant we need to remember that together we face challenges and we must prepare towards in light of the COP but we must do the work we need so that all stakeholders are engaged particularly migrant communities because they have their role to play they have a voice to be heard and it is up to us to create conditions that enable them to express themselves I really liked my colleagues discourse he talked about very important points we are not usually used to hearing this framework helps us to hear voices we do not usually hear and this allows us to change our perception our vision of things because we have much to learn from one another this is in the collective interest of the migrants migrants have concerns they know what they've gone through and they have needs if we can meet them together we can find solutions to meet their needs that are so legitimate we need different regional frameworks and different dialogue frameworks which will help us to socialise together on these important issues because we are really all going in the same direction but if we do not work together we cannot learn to work as a collective in a positive manner in the interest of the migrant communities thank you very much once again for the opportunity that has been given to us so we could together share these concerns and hopefully we can all progress on such important issues yes thank you we will not hesitate to call upon you you can be sure thank you once again Mr Dio I will now give the 30 second challenge Miss Osman Elasha one key message okay thank you thank you very much I think on a positive tone about migrants I think they they maintain links with their countries and they are they really care and they like to share what they gained so and this is very evident so they create this type of networks during crisis and they mobilise resources we have seen this during the recent Sudan revolution we have seen it during some of the climate change related floods that were very destructive in many parts of Sudan we saw them mobilise resources and printing back home I mean these kind of networks that can be formed seasonally on ad hoc basis could be a more utilised if a strategy to make use of the migrant capacity their financial support to have like kind of adaptation projects something that is sustainable not only on relief like on crisis but something that will link them more to their homes and also having a sustainable impact thank you thank you so much, message well received Miss Enya Sederan 30 seconds key message I'll speak very quickly first of all the discussion today shows that there is a shared understanding for the need to scale up the shift in displacement settings and I think that we all have a role to play here the private sector can bring in the technology and the competence humanitarian sector has the local knowledge and understanding of needs for operations and for the vulnerable populations they support and what we share is of course a very strong commitment to the Juno-Harm principle that also humanitarian actors take steps to reduce their carbon footprint in their host countries and then just the last comment if we really want to scale this up and scale up the green transition I think that also deifies like the Africa Bank and IFC can also play an important catalyst role and especially when there is a local development factor here I think that should be very much aligned with the core mission of theirs but the key is that from a climate perspective we start to run out of time I mean we're nowhere close to reaching the goals of the Paris Agreement and we really need to accelerate the shift and the point is that a value proposition is not really proven before you can actually show that it actually works I think it's important now to feel that urgency and find flexible ways of implementing more green projects to build that legacy and that is what we've done with IOM in South Sudan and we demonstrate that this works Thank you Enya I love the last words since it shows that it works Thank you so much 30 seconds Mr Irfan Yes so my main message you can say the main theme would be to build for our better and greener it's the time of transition from effective youth participation to effective youth leadership so listen to us not just work for us but work with us. Thank you Thank you so much the voice of youth that goes far into the future and last but not least Mr Belal Altineso we go back to you 30 seconds 30 seconds One last word The last word is not for me but we need to speak frequently having been pessimist throughout our generation we now need to update the way we think and work for the future generations we must change our behaviors we must be more humble we must listen to the planet we must review our ways of consumption we must review our solidarity and our humanity we must tell migrants that the world is yours and inshallah everything will work out for the better as I've said long live the planet we together we are the sons and daughters of the planet we are all here on planet earth together the planet that we love yes we do not want to migrate to Mars I do agree with you so thank you so so much to this lovely panel thanks to all the people who took the floor if there are extra questions we'll pass them on to you very specifically thank you for all colleagues and all audience we will now close this fourth panel and we move to our last panel