 So, the background for this is the significant breakthrough that we achieved in COP 27 just a few months ago in Sharmal Sheikh in Egypt, where we made a breakthrough agreement on addressing loss and damage by supporting the establishment of a funding mechanism to support the victims of climate change impacts and causing losses and damages around the world. This has been a demand from the developing countries for a long time, particularly the vulnerable developing countries, least developed countries in the small line. But we had not been successful in getting the other developed countries to agree to it. We managed to make that achievement in Sharmal Sheikh all the developed countries agreed, including the United States, who are the most recalcitrant and did not want to agree. But they have agreed and we welcome their agreement and we really praise them for having agreed. That agreement, even though there is still a long way to go before any money is going to be available, the fact that they have agreed to work together opens up the possibility to actually do things on the ground. And so there are now two avenues through which this issue is going to be addressed. The first avenue is the negotiations. As I just mentioned, we have the agreement under the agreement. They are setting up a transitional committee. The committee has actually been set up already. The transitional committee will be meeting in late March in Egypt, and they will then develop their work program. And in COP28 in November or December in Dubai, we hope to make further progress on the UNFCC process. But the UNFCC process is not going to be very fast. UNFCC by its very nature is going to take time. COP28, we hope, will make a significant difference, but we may not achieve everything. By COP28, we may have to go to COP29 for the UNFCC to deliver any kind of finance. At the same time, outside the UNFCC, there is finance beginning to flow to support loss and damage. The German government and G7 have the global shield. The Climate Vulnerable Forum and V20 have a loss and damage window in there. A number of others like the Scottish government have put money forward, the Belgians have put money forward. So there is a modest amount of funding that is beginning to flow already to support activities on the ground. And so in that context, what we do on the ground to deal with the impacts of climate change now, become much, much more important and more urgent than waiting for December for COP. It's happening now. Just in the last few days, Hurricane Freddy hit Madagascar, Mozambique and Malawi. A few days ago, California had floods. Now California has no storms. So it's happening everywhere. Just watch CNN news and you'll see weather events going on around the world, unusual weather events causing impacts of climate change, causing losses and damages associated with those impacts. So the reality on the ground is far more urgent than having negotiations, even though negotiations are important. And so this initiative that we have come up with together with IID and ICAD is to support efforts on the ground, particularly focusing on the most vulnerable countries, the group of least developed countries, the group of small island states, but others as well who may be interested in building the capacity, knowledge and ability to deal with the issues on the ground. And a number of them have already initiated. We are already working with them and talking with them. And we're very glad today to officially be launching this new initiative. And we are inviting others to join us. It's a very open initiative. We welcome participation from governments, from funders, from NGOs, researchers who have an interest in working on loss and damage issues together with us. So with those words of welcome and opening, let me now invite Tom Mitchell from IID to say a few words of welcome as well. Tom, over to you. Thank you very much, Salim. Absolutely delighted to be here in Dakar. And as Salim said, one of my my first trips and I couldn't be more delighted to be here with a country that has been so much at the forefront of of action on climate change, adaptation and now on and loss and damage. And of course, much of that down to Salim's leadership. So I'm delighted that this all act launch can be together between IID and ICAD and really is the kind of culmination of many years of close cooperation. So excellent to see everybody else in the room and also welcome to those online. So I just want to talk for a moment about the gestation of this program because I think it's important to understand the way that this has been built on a listening exercise on what the reality was on the ground. It wasn't necessarily front and center in those discussions. And so we wanted to address that really looking at what the experiences were of local people of loss and damage. But also to understand what the practical solutions were. You know, we've been dealing with impacts of climate change in different ways for some time. There are lots of practical solutions. So we began a process of deliberative dialogues, engaging very much with those LDCs and SIDS that Salim mentioned and really asking local organizations, communities, say, what is their experience of loss and damage and equally what's needed and what are the practical solutions that we can take forward rather than waiting for an international process to catch up. And so what we heard is the following. The first that loss and damage is happening now and that there is plenty of practical solutions that we could be getting on with now if only we could enhance them fast. Second, that we need to build confidence between those vulnerable countries and the richer countries. And the way to do that is to build solidarity around tackling loss and damage through enabling those practical solutions. So let's focus on the ground, on those solutions and that that is a way that we can build trust and momentum. Third thing that we heard that the successfully tackling loss and damage at a country level and a community level cannot be done by just one organization. It needs a whole team approach. And here with a team approach, we mean involving diverse organizations already with experience of working with communities and connecting that from the international community down to the local level and vice versa. So this needs a strong integrated approach embedded with the existing comprehensive risk management strategies. No point of doing something completely separate when we know we've got an opportunity to integrate something and it will be stronger. Fourth thing that we heard is that any money that we earmarked to tackle loss and damage has to have right from the start an inbuilt mechanism to get that resource to where it needs to be. So we cannot have approach of stalling that money in multiple layers of bureaucracy. Let's find the approaches right now that can empower those communities to act when they need to act. And the last point that we heard is that actually developing a solidarity-based approach, something based around climate justice that brings countries and communities together can help to showcase a way forward. This is going to be something that we're going to need to build across multiple countries, multiple experiences. So let's get on now with demonstrating how it can happen in very practical ways that brings together vulnerable countries together with rich countries. And so that is really the spirit of All Act. It's about a practical demonstration of what's possible and making sure something is anchored in community experience and practical experience from the outset. Let me pause there and I will pass on to my colleague, Ritu has very much been at the forefront of designing All Act to tell you about the details. So thank you so much, Salim and Tom both, for setting that context. And I'll be talking to you more about what this All Act is and how are we actually going to address some of the issues and challenges that both Salim and Tom talked about. Can we go to the next slide, please? So Tom mentioned about this deliberative dialogue process. And in this deliberative dialogue process, people who were participating actually shared what the realities of loss and damage is, how they are dealing with it on a day-to-day basis. And one thing that clearly came out from that was tackling loss and damage was not straightforward. One, loss and damage is caused by both extreme events as well as long-term slow onset events. Two, their impacts are highly varied, encompassing economic impacts that can be readily quantified to those that cannot be easily monetized. Then it also manifests itself differently for different countries, regions and communities. So any for addressing loss and damage risks, we need solutions that can work in diverse country contexts. But if you look at the current financing and delivery mechanism, they're not fit for purpose. Not only are they insufficient, they're inefficient as well. They have seen multilateral funding mechanisms like Green Climate Fund. Any least developed country, right from going from accreditation process to submitting a proposal to finally getting it, you take minimum five and a half years, and that's minimum, that's average. Countries have taken much more than that. So supporting and financing for addressing loss and damage therefore must be grounded in the everyday realities of loss and damage tailored to the vulnerabilities of different peoples and places and require a more comprehensive approach that are anticipatory, agile, as well as responsive to the immediate, medium and long-term needs. And for this, we are launching this all-act initiative, which is Alliance for Locally Led Transformative Action on Loss and Damage, which will directly support countries to establish a national facility. And what this national facility would do is to support these countries which are experiencing loss and damage to optimize their existing finances, expertise, resources, and delivery mechanism in a way that makes them ready to deploy any additional fund which might be available in future. And here we are saying, we are hoping that loss and damage fund gets resourced very quickly and we have that available for implementation. Next slide, please. So how will this all-act really address some of these issues that I just talked about? Firstly, we will try to use that bottom-up process for doing that comprehensive risk management planning. And by this, we are hoping that we don't go into these, into this planning process with preconceived solutions, rather allow it to emerge bottom-up with the community and then compile it up national and then at the national level. Second, what we really want to do is we have a very limited funding available right now for tackling loss and damage. And they are in the form of humanitarian assistance, social protection program, country's own budgets. And in some countries like Bangladesh has come up with catastrophe fund, Senegal has just announced loss and damage fund. So how do we harmonize the existing sources of funding in a way that it is able to finance that bottom-up planning process that would emerge? And for this, we are proposing that this national facility will be able to layer or mix and match some of these existing sources of finances. And we are also hoping to use some of the new opportunities of funding which have emerged in the form of global shield. And thirdly, what we really want to do is to create that social and collaborative knowledge network of institutions, organizations that would really support the implementation of this initiative at the local level. And as this happens, we are hoping that right now there's not much experience out there but when these practical solutions actually start getting implemented that passive knowledge would start flowing up. And then we'll start getting to know which solutions are really working, which working where and in what circumstances and which of them can be scaled up. And that this national facility and this alliance would actually try to support that peer-to-peer learning between countries, communities at different level. Next slide, please. And to support this initiative under loss and damage, we are also planning to develop this loss and damage observatory because we all know that there is a knowledge gap when we talk about addressing loss and damage. And that's in the form of, you know, you go and do a Google search on loss and damage, you'll get Prathora of research papers. But what's lacking there is that bottom-up evidence, really talking about the realities of loss and damage challenges that countries and communities and especially how it's compounding their existing development deficit, that is lacking. Many of these papers, they don't get published even if they are available bottom-up, they don't get published in international peer-reviewed journals. So they are not able to influence that national and international discourse in the way it should. And there's not enough focus on non-economic loss and damage. So what we are going to do is, next slide, please, develop this loss and damage observatory. It will be an online resource or repository of all the research which is available out there. And within that, we are also planning to create this digital archive or an online museum where we store all the non-economic loss and damage that is available. And for this, we are planning to partner and network with some of the museums which are available in the country. But how do we really want this loss and damage observatory to work in reality? We want to create it as a community-owned resource which is co-owned and co-developed by the researchers in this space. And they would be the ones who'd be shaping, assessing and establishing how this observatory would work and function, how standardized methodologies, because another issue that you've seen within the loss and damage space is even if we know there are certain non-economic loss and damage happening, we don't have right methodologies to really assess them. And when, even where we have them, we like, if one entity or one research institution does that assessment, nobody, they're not available in a form that somebody else can build on them. So what we intend to do is through this observatory, we focus on collective knowledge generation, try to break down some of these institutional barriers because many of these research, even if it is happening in Global South, they're quite siloed. So we need to break down those institutional barriers and country boundaries and come up with more interdisciplinary research which allows some of these innovations around methodologies to happen and then also create that South-South North mentorship and peer support network. So with that, so this is how in a nutshell, and if you're interested in knowing more, we have two briefings which have been published, so which will provide you more details. Can we take down the presentation, please? So with that, and I think we have spoken enough from this side of the table, and we really want to invite those who have played a very crucial role in shaping this initiative. And we have like IAD and ECAD, we have what we have done is we have just facilitated, but this idea for this whole all-act initiative has really emerged from the diverse stakeholder base within LDCs and states and also our developed country partners who joined these deliberative dialogue quite actively. So first, this session, this entire launch is divided into three sessions, and in the first session, we are going to invite our representatives from these developed countries and small island development states. And it's my pleasure. Can we take down the slide, please? And it's my pleasure to first invite Dr. Christopher Bartlett who is speaking on behalf of National Advisory Board on Climate Change and Disaster and Risk Reduction, Government of Anwatu. And before I call in Chris, almost everyone knows him in this space and he's been like a stalwart pushing for practical solution and innovative efforts within the space. So over to you, Chris. Okay, thank you very much. And thank you for that very kind introduction and good morning, good day to all of you. I'm very, very pleased to be joining the members of this new Alliance for Transformative Action on Climate Loss and Damage. As you know, devastatingly, loss and damage is being suffered at this very moment by the entire nation of Anwatu. Over the last five days, we have experienced direct hits by not one, but two severe hurricanes. The first, a category four took down our communications networks, washed out roads in the outer islands, swamped our food gardens and damaged the village evacuation centers where people were sheltering. The second, a category five storm, less than 48 hours later, smashed the pieces, our homes, livelihoods and any remaining sense of security that the people of Anwatu will ever be safe on their own indigenous lands. This is not right, this is unjust, yet this is the reality of loss and damage. Moving forward from this very moment, the government of Anwatu has before us a nearly impossible development pathway. First, we have to address the loss and damage that has resulted over these last days by these fossil fuel emissions driven storms. Secondly, we have to continue to provide even the most basic services of health, of education and of security to a population that has been ravaged. And third, we have to prepare for the next extreme event which we all know is just around the corner as we also daily battle the slow onset erosion of our coastlines from sea level rise, the dissolution of our coral reefs from ocean acidification, the death of seagrass beds from bleaching and the changing rainfall patterns which are upending our subsistence food production. Friends, is there any doubt at all what happens when state obligations to climate action are not met? But here's the issue. Why are states convinced that the only rules that they have to follow are those that are under the UNFCCC? From our view and our reading of international law, there are climate obligations across international legal instruments. From protecting human rights in our two rights covenants, to upholding the duty to protect and preserve the marine environment under the UN convention on the law of the sea, to adhering to the principles of preventing cross border harm that are enshrined within the charter of the United Nations. International law is crystal clear. There are obligations that we've already agreed to and there are legal consequences where states by their acts or emissions have caused significant harm to the climate system with particular respect to vulnerable states and people and individuals of present and future generations. But friends, while this week has been particularly despairing for the people of Anuatu, there is also a great sense of optimism. On the same day of the first storm, more than 100 nations formally confirmed their co-sponsorship of a UN General Assembly resolution asking the world's highest court, the UN International Court of Justice to look at the law and tell us what those state obligations and legal consequences are. And today there are more than 112 countries from the global south and the global north who are joining us in this attempt to finally get the clarity that we need to do better and to clarify the guardrails between which states must act to prevent the kind of loss and damage, prevent the kind of suffering that Anuatu and so many others are experiencing. Saving the Paris Agreement for us means moving forward in solidarity from the grassroots to the international, being faster and more ambitious with our international cooperation and protecting the rule of international law and our shared desire for human rights. So we can and we must act together. Vanuatu, in Vanuatu, you have one of the strongest allies in this all act alliance for loss and damage and of course an ally in the existential fight for planetary resilience. Thank you so much. Thank you so much, Christopher. And now I'll invite another great supporter and he was such an active voice in all our deliberative dialogue with and who always came up with not just solutions but solutions that he had practically tried. So it's my immense pleasure to invite Krishan Kumar Singh who's the head of MEA unit, Ministry of Planning and Development in Trinidad and Pavego. Thank you very much, Ritu. And thank you for the opportunity to share my thoughts on this important and evolving issue. But first off, let me congratulate IID and ICAD on this initiative. I think it's a wonderful initiative. It's something that I've been advocating for time and time again. I would like to, I think the issues of loss and damage and the vulnerability of small island states and LDCs are well established. What I would want to do in my intervention really is to now link the international arrangements under the Paris Agreement, which is the new funding and the new funding arrangements and the new fund to what is now required at the national level and the sectoral level. So while the decision looks at the establishment of a fund and funding arrangements as well, I would assume that any design of any funding arrangements, which I would interpret to be in addition to a fund, any design of any funding arrangements of fund need to address a few things that will be specifically designed to meet the needs of countries that are suffering loss and damage. So in designing the funding arrangements, including the fund, I think it's usually related to its structure, how it would function, how it would deliver funding, targeted funding to those countries and those sectors that need it. How would the form follow function? For example, this has been a topical issue throughout the negotiations. What should it address? What specifically should it address and how it should it addresses? What principles should guide the operationalization of the funding arrangements, for example? How would it differ from the existing arrangements, the funding arrangements that we have, the SCCF, for example, the adaptation fund, the GCF, and we heard some of that as well. How would different entities contribute to such a fund? How would it be capitalized? What would be the guiding mechanisms of such capitalization? I think all of this is important in considering the international architecture of any financing arrangement or arrangements to targeted loss and damage. But having said that, I think it's also important or critically important to understand because there's a growing notion that mitigation and adaptation can address loss and damage and that loss and damage really is delayed adaptation. I think in designing the fund and designing the targeted areas for addressing loss and damage that these notions need to be separate and distinctly distilled in a way. So the response to loss and damage is not delayed adaptation because what that would imply is that you can fix it. In any extreme weather event, whether it's a storm or flood or hurricane, there would always be residual loss and damage that we're experiencing now. So in my opinion, linking the international funding architecture to the targeted areas of where funding is needed for loss and damage requires a bottom-up approach and it requires for countries to take ownership to develop capacity to determining loss and damage not only associated with southern and extreme weather events but certainly the long-term slow onset that we all know the sea level rise and the non-economic losses and so on. So that I think this is a very good initiative. I would support it. The need for building capacity at a ground level to separate the developmental signal from the climate signal, for example, would be critical to providing the empirical evidence for loss and damage. It will provide the ownership at all levels of governance but it's the national government, local government, civil society at a community level. Building that capacity, developing methodologies to identify loss and damage and quantifying its impacts would be critically important for that kind of empirical evidence and case building to be had. So I got the tone for me to wrap up. So I will just leave it at that as my initial thoughts on how we are now linking the international financial architecture related to loss and damage to what is now required at the national level. Thank you very much, Vithu. Thank you so much, Kishan. We were supposed to have Yamikani address after this from Allavi and all of you who have been part of this deliberate dialogue process would know how active he was in all these discussions but sadly his grandmother died yesterday so he is not able to make it today. So I'll invite Dr. Anil Pokhriyal who's the chief executive national disaster risk reduction and management authority in Nepal to come in next. Hi, Ritu. Am I audible? Yes. Thank you. Good day, good evening, everyone. I'm really delighted to be part of this launch for locally-led adaptive approaches for transformative actions on climate change loss and damage. Really, one of those countries like our earlier speakers particularly Kishan and Christopher Manson we actually equal the damage and the loss that we're already confronting with Sifrin since last year alone. We started on the very onset day of Manson, a catastrophic landslide that washed away releases and water supply projects that would have brought Kathmandu's water supply and created billions of dollars of damages and deaths as well. On the other hand, on the very day after the end of the Manson itself, we got battered by inundation all over the country also leading to a near-nation wide-club profilia. These are some signature events that we've been experiencing in the Nepal Himalaya and starting with, again, what Ritu earlier mentioned, something setting up an observatory for loss and damage with something that government of Nepal and particularly the national disaster risk reduction and land authority would be benefiting out of this process. But also, on the other hand, we could also kind of report back so the lessons that we've been able to collectively do, again, I want to go back to Tom's word on how do you team it together and break those silos, work across multiple disciplines and to really address all of these issues at the local level. So the lapas that we've been able to collectively do in Nepal that actually transcends down to the provincial and the local level is such one example that could also contribute to this whole discourse that we've been part of it. So capacity building across multiple ministries and departments, financing to address all of these issues is something that actually we are currently in funding with. And so we're really delighted to be part of this alliance and in particularly he really looking forward to working with you all, especially in terms of, again, grappling some of those issues that you currently confront with. The NDR may say the National Disaster Research and Management Authority would really need support, especially in terms of bringing in other ministries, other departments, other disciplines to really collectively address this issue for the case of Nepal, but perhaps also contribute to the global discourse on this particular issue. So with these words, I really want to thank the entire team, ICAD and IED for congratulating on this launch of this and a very timely initiative that countries like Nepal would hugely benefit. Thank you. Thank you. Over to you, Ritu. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you so much, Anil. And we all know the LAPA process and how you're actually using that bottom-up LAPA process to develop that loss and damage strategy. So great initiative and it'd be great. We'll be able to try out something different in Nepal with a national facility approach. So with that, I'm going to invite Selma Wubit, who is the program coordinator, Climate Tolerable Forum. Good morning, good afternoon. Can you hear me? Yes. Okay, great. I like how Salim started saying what we need to do with the UNFCCC and outside the UNFCCC and I think that's the best approach to discussing loss and damage. It's important that we strengthen everything that is possible to be strengthened within UNFCCC and it's a massive achievement that we now have to work on a fund that is completely dedicated to loss and damage and this in fact would help, especially with the issue of access to finance. So it's important that we engage within the multilateral platform. But at the same time, now that we have so many partners that are keen on engaging on loss and damage, what is it that we can possibly do? And one of the things that we could do is to work on initiatives like this. We also have similar programs that we're working on as part of the global shield. And all this initiatives would respond to the existing loss and damage and this could be a resource that countries can tap into. And one of the things that cannot be denied is loss and damage is already happening. Whether there is a source to fund for it, local communities will continue to fail the pressure of the changing climate. And if we only look at the CVF countries which are like 58 member countries representing over 1.5 billion population, it's affecting their economy to a degree where they have to lose 1% of their GDP every year. If it was not for loss and damage, CVF countries would have been 20% well there than they are right now. And if we don't do anything, this will continue to be the case. And one of the things that we have to look into is the temperature is definitely going beyond and warming is set to be 1.2 degree in the next decade. Even if we do mitigation efforts, even if we work on adaptation, we still need to address loss and damage because was it 1.5 degree, there would still be economy clauses. And this is why we need to work on this different initiatives. So one of the reasons that we've launched the V20 Fund is to tackle those challenges that communities are facing at this day and age. And with this, we're working with different partners and it's now part of the global shield which is one of the things that we've been pushing for. But one of the things that we wanted to highlight in this work as part of the UNFCCC as well is the payment of our due campaign which was quite an essential campaign in assuring that we did end up having a COP decision saying we need to work on financing for loss and damage and establishing this fund. But the other thing that we need to discuss going forward and now that we have the committee is yes, we now have a decision to work on financing loss and damage and we can work on the funding mechanisms and all, but how do we make sure that the challenges that developing countries face and accessing finance are not going to be a challenge with this new finance mechanism that we are trying to establish. So working towards this new fund, we also need to look into access issues and we also need to make sure that there is a predictability of finance within this new arrangement. And this would be something we would continue to engage in going forward. Thank you very much. Thank you so much. I'll next invite Lubna Yasmeen, Joint Secretary, Ministry of Environment and Forest and Climate Change at Bangladesh Government. Yeah, okay. Thank you so much for inviting me to this program today. Actually, this initiative of locally-led approaches for transformative action on loss and damage, I think it's a very good approach. And as you know, and we all know, I mean, we are, because Bangladesh is a very vulnerable country, context of climate change. So, and there is no time for wait for us or to go, I mean, plan for any kind of weird actions. So we need to go for actions immediately. So this is our urgent need of our country. So we have to work immediately. And I welcome this initiative, this all at their initiatives that to help our country and other climate vulnerable countries in solving issues and also support the locally-led approaches to make the people climate resilient. Actually, this is very important actually to put the people actually in the center of the action because we also want this, our community to help them directly so that they can solve their own problems by themselves. Because, you know, our country is long-term, they're struggling with climate change and natural disasters, climate change issues, everything. I mean, this is actually regular phenomenon of our country's nature. So we, our people are already, they have become very spot in, you know, with coming with the new innovative solutions. So if we can help them directly and we can put the people in the center of everything, I think this will be more effective. Also this, locally-led approaches are also an element of our national adaptation plan, which our government is in the verge of implementing it very soon there. I mean, we are planning and we are working on it. And we need support from domestic as well as international support. So this is a very good approach. And I would also like to share my feelings regarding this locally-led approaches because we have a national adaptation plan and we are working on it. So I mean, I would expect better coordination and communication with government in whatever actions or whatever mechanism coming up with this all act initiatives. I think they should, I mean, we are, our door is open to share everything and all out support. So we need your coordination and communication with us as well. So I thank you everyone to inviting me and to give me opportunity to share my feelings. So I wish all success to all act initiatives. Thank you. Thank you. So next we were supposed to have Madeline from Senegal, but again, unfortunately today is also coincides with LDC five meeting. And we're still hoping she'll be able to join a bit later, but we'll just continue forward with the next session. And if she's able to join, finish off a meeting, then probably we'll have her towards the end. Like when Salim started saying that we now have hope because of this loss and damage fund being created now. And many developed countries coming forward, not just developed countries, but philanthropies coming forward to support loss and damage. So, and even during our own deliberative dialogue process, we saw many of developed countries join in and contribute to supporting the emergence of those practical solutions that they came out with. So with that, I'm actually now going to turn towards some of these progressive developed countries and philanthropies to share their vision for tackling loss and damage, the key funding priorities, the focus area of action and how do they think this all act initiative can help in realizing some of that vision that they have. And with that, I'm first going to invite Dr. Heike Henn, who's Director of Climate Energy and Environment with German Federal Ministry of Economic Cooperation and Development. Hello everybody, good afternoon, good evening. I hope you can hear me well. Yes. It's such a pleasure to be with you at least virtually and congratulations already, not only to the initiative, but really the excellent discussion and inputs from all people involved. It's really inspiring for this important year for action on less than damage, but like Salim and other speakers that there's not the important year or the important process, all of us together have really get our act together and achieve more coherent and systemic and sustained financing and action for climate impacts and disaster and for loss and damage on the ground. And I think this message comes very strongly out of the discussion, but definitely the new alliance will all act. And a couple of points I would like to mention that resonate a lot with our thinking and hopefully doing on loss and damage. I think what came out strongly is the clear focus on the most vulnerable. And it's not only ADCs and fit stairs, of course a strong focus, but we all know that vulnerability in the age of climate impacts is multi-dimensional and varies in space and time. And therefore what you all have been talking about so far and what all act is about identifying and delivering, not only talking about it, but doing it successfully, solutions tailored to local needs and priorities is really crucial. And that is what you were talking about, the local and national experiences that needs, but also access for the local actors to implement what they have as best practice as best solutions. And I think the respective national structures, the ownership, but also the capacities that Kishan was talking about, are really key to make this happening. And one of the proposals that is also in the all act initiative, the national loss and damage facilities, I think can very strongly support this country ownership of all stakeholders involved. And I think in these processes is also key to include all vulnerable groups and stakeholders to learn from this bottom up approach. And the third aspect I would just like to highlight from the all act that resonates a lot is the sense of calibration, to overcome really the fragmentation and also the limits and the gaps that we are seeing all around us. And I think we all have and can do better to facilitate this kind of calibration. And Germany tries to be really a constructive partner in this, knowing the historic responsibilities and acting also in the sense of climate justice. We try to be heavily and constructively engaged politically, financially, financially, but also in seeking collaboration. Some of you already mentioned the global shield, the V20, our Santhe G7, try to bring an initiative forward that tries to foster specifically these kind of collaboration or new collaboration efforts that focus really strongly on the national ownership and what is needed and happening in country. And therefore, I don't want to talk too much about the global shield, just to ensure everybody that we will continue to engage in this open-minded spirit to foster action. And I see with our focus on national ownership and national processes, a lot of interlinkages we can explore further with what all act is about. And we are happy to be a good partner in this as well. So looking forward, some of you also mentioned the transitional committee and the work coming up. I think no matter what the process is, it's important that we really focus on what we need to deliver in order to make vulnerable people and not only reacting but striving in the area of climate impacts. So that we do not lose the development gains that instead we can increase development everywhere, globally, despite of climate impacts. And to do that, we really have to have a joint approach. I think we have no time and no money to waste on loss and damage politics or icons but we really have to act jointly and find the solutions that work best and most efficiently and are accessible for vulnerable groups, for vulnerable countries and come up with innovative solutions in doing so and Germany will certainly be a partner for you in this endeavor. So over to you again. Thank you. Thank you so much. And we really look forward to having Germany and Global Shield with us in this effort, especially in terms of providing anticipatory support to address some of these loss and damage impacts that we are seeing. So next time I'm going to invite Shanid Walsh who's Climate Director and Deputy Director General Department of Foreign Affairs, Government of Ireland. Thanks very much, Ritu. And good to see everyone. I hope you can hear me okay. I was a little reserved on what I could say after Haika because Ireland and Germany are so close together when it comes to loss and damage and indeed a lot of the earlier speakers like Christopher and Kishan and others there's a lot of people in the room and in the virtual room that we work so closely with already. So I didn't want to be repetitive but maybe I will highlight a few points that maybe that could add a bit of value but I think broadly speaking, we're all very committed to loss and damage finance and this has been a huge priority for Ireland and we've been engaging with many of you. And I think coming to your question, Ritu, on what we prioritize. I mean, I think we prioritize the same areas that we prioritize in the rest of our work and in adaptation. So it's locally led solutions, it's vulnerability, it's LDCs and SIDSs. So we don't have a particular loss and damage kind of different way of working. And I actually think that's maybe one important point and actually Madeleine who you mentioned and Yamakani who could join us today. We were all together last week at the LIFE AR board meeting in Senegal. And I think one thing that comes out from that locally led adaptation initiative but is also maybe worth us all remembering for loss and damage is the need to link very closely with existing development and humanitarian work which is often very much overlapping with what we want to do in loss and damage. It's not to say it's the whole story. I think there are real gaps on loss and damage and one of the ones that is very important to us and that I wanted to mention was the non-economic Ritu which you mentioned also earlier in areas like for example, cultural heritage and that kind of thing we don't feel as though they get nearly enough attention in the sort of the current let's say landscape. And so that's an area that I know some of you are at a workshop we have last year with ODI on non-economic loss and damage and we'll have a research paper on it coming out quite soon which will share with people who are interested but it'll be on the web. So I think that's one of the priorities for us. We are very happy to be part of the Global Shield. We're very happy to be a part of initiatives like SOF on the early warning side and of course I think we feel as though the loss and damage journey even though for people like Salim it's been going on for a very long time and for many of you in this room but I think as far as the landscape is concerned the charm was a big milestone as people have said and we're certainly gonna be happy to participate in the transitional committee in fact in a shared seat with our German colleagues to bring some of these principles forward. Maybe a couple of other points that we will also try to be emphasizing in that work and indeed in the work that we continue to do ourselves. I think vulnerability has been talked about and Haike talked about the different dimensions of that. I think we need to be careful that we don't just talk about vulnerable countries we also talk about vulnerable groups. I think in some conflict affected countries it can be very difficult if we are limited in our funding to simply working through national governments. I think access points have come out a lot by Samo and others and we really need to ask ourselves the new loss and damage financing mechanisms and funds how are these going to be different? We know the issues that have been there with previous and current funds. I think we need to look very much in the work on the transitional committee in particular on broadening the donor base. We need a much broader base of donors we need all hands on deck essentially for loss and damage. And I think there's also some real opportunities this year when we think about innovative sources of finance there's a lot of energy around the World Bank spring meetings around the Macron Motley Summit in June and how can we try to have some of those discussions actually be directed towards what I think we could all agree is an enormous financing need for loss and damage. And so those are just a few of the points Ritu that are important to us. I think all act is extremely timely and pertinent when you talk about issues like access and as others have said, being able to share learning and maybe just to highlight one point which is around evidence. This is such an emerging area and I think any evidence that can be collected at your level can also be something extremely useful for the transitional committee but indeed these sort of funds and so on going forward and the UNFCCC process. So well done for putting it all together in such a timely way and we certainly look forward also as a very strong partner of IUD to continue engaging with us. Thanks a lot. Thank you. Thank you so much, Jameid. Next I'd like to call Jamathana who's the senior adaptation advisor UK Foreign Commonwealth Office. Hi, everyone. Thanks very much for giving me the opportunity to join you in what's a really important initiative and a really important conversation. Many people have already made incredibly valuable points already, I will try not to repeat them but many of what's already been said chimes a lot with our thinking and our UK priorities in this area. I mean, I just wanted to start by, I mean, the issue is very incredibly challenging. There's so many difficulties just in terms of actually how to tackle it in a practical way at a national or community level. Many of those issues have been highlighted by earlier speakers in terms of some of those overlapping risks that communities and countries face. We've also touched upon the difficult conversations that have happened at an international level, about the different competing visions, understanding ideas, solutions, there are some of which have really made that conversation quite difficult. But as we've all said, that step taken at COP 27 was incredibly important in terms of the collective step in our global understanding and response and hopefully starts a pathway for better collaboration and coming up with those innovative ideas that will actually work at a national level. I really think that this initiative is exciting in terms of helping us on that journey and a really interesting way to start bringing in that thinking from the ground, which is gonna be critical in coming up with a way forward. I mean, from the UK point of view, some of the areas that are important to us, finance, obviously, but not just in terms of quantity, in terms of really understanding how we make different parts of the international system start to work better, how it can be more responsive, how it can be more agile. Sinead just mentioned some of those innovative financial finance agendas that are underway and critical meeting coming up, understanding how they can feed into the loss and damage and debate will be really critical. But I think most importantly, and where this all-act initiative comes in, it's about finding those mechanisms that help to join up those international global responses to the national and to the local level. It's also about ensuring that those that are most vulnerable are actually included in the conversation around solutions and can help actually drive forward and identify what we should be focusing on, which will be incredibly important from the UK perspective and I hope from what happens under the UNFCCC. I mean, we've also touched on the broader adaptation, loss and damage spectrum, which is important for the UK. We're investing things like the global shield in broader climate risk management. We're also looking at crude, reef and that broader spectrum about early warning, early action. Really understanding how those bits of the jigsaw can all join up at a local level and I hope that the all-act initiative will help shed some light on that and feed that into the conversations that are happening at the international level. I mean, really all-act, the learning observatory, the really important role to play in filling some of those research and knowledge gaps and not just research gaps, actually implementing action on the ground and providing that learning for all of us that are involved in the loss and damage conversation. I think I'd like to really underline the locally led action point from the UK's perspective. That's going to be very important to us in terms of the loss and damage conversations. We've committed a further 10 million to the Life AR initiative and it feels like there's a lot of parallels between that and all-act, that understanding about how you get solutions at the ground and start to connect from the local level up. And I think anything all-act can do to bring that into the conversation and particularly take the learning from the Life AR, bring that to all-act and then bring that to the international conversations will be critical. Secondly, that issue around agile and accessible finance. So the UK supported the access to finance task force and I think understanding that and what's happening in other climate finance mechanisms and bringing that understanding to the loss and damage debate will be critical. And thirdly, I'd just like to reinforce the issue of science. I think a previous speaker spoke about the development signal, about the climate signal and understanding what that looks like at a local level. And from our perspective in the UK, making sure the best climate science brought into these conversations and all these initiatives will be critical. I mean, I think just to finally say, I think over the next 12 months, we in the UK really want to push on this agenda. We're on the transitional committee. We want to continue to be a progressive member of that discussion. And I think I just wanted to end by reinforcing the point that I thought was very important in terms of the discussions within the UNFCCC and outside the UNFCCC, outside the UNFCCC is where all the action is happening and where initiatives like ORLAC can really make a difference in bringing learning and practical examples of what works from the ground into those broader discussions. And the UK will really be keen to partner both ORLAC and other initiatives in place to start to bridge that gap between the international discussions and the practical examples on the ground. And we stand by ready to work with everyone in the room here and elsewhere on that. So thank you very much. Thank you so much, Dehma. And especially both you and Sinead mentioned that this initiative is timely. This initiative is timely both for transition committee but also for addressing that growing impact of loss and damage that is happening. Next, I will invite Christina Chan, who's the senior adaptation advisor for the US special presidential envoy for climate. Thank you so much, Ritu. And thanks to IED and ICAD for hosting this really important meeting, which is much needed, I think, as we are sort of ending the first quarter of 2023 and all of the work that we have ahead of us this year on loss and damage. I want to take the opportunity to thank ICAD, IED and the countries that are now part of demonstrating the practical actions through all act. I think it's really exciting piece of work that's being launched today. And for the US really keen to learn from the national experience with the practical actions, including with respect to the national level planning and integration and the development of these national facilities from what I understand key to this is bringing together all aspects in a given country from the DRR community and the disaster risk management community, the humanitarian response community within a given country all the way to also the climate adaptation community and the emerging loss and damage community. I think that's going to be really important lessons and practical experience coming out of the all act countries that will be very important for us to learn from internationally. I also wanted to pick up on two things with respect to all act. It's a point that Gemma just raised and others I think have also raised in terms of lessons learned from life AR the US is also a strong supporter of life AR and not only is it in my view just from what I understand of all act it's learning from the life AR experience with supporting locally led adaptation. It is a question to the all act countries but if there is an overlap between the all act countries and the life AR countries how much interest is there in utilizing the national facilities and the national infrastructure that life AR that countries are building vis-a-vis life AR and how much interest is there in integrating into that existing structure or is it more about creating a different structure? So that's just a question to consider or to learn more about. I'm really, really glad that to hear that all act will have a loss and damage observatory. Ritu, I was laughing a little bit when you remarked about Google searching because I was just sharing in a different meeting last week on loss and damage how some of my research, the research of our team is actually using Google to learn more. And what we found in our research is that there isn't, there doesn't seem to be a lot out there foundable on a Google search on approaches to addressing slow onset events or approaches to dealing with non-economic losses. And to the extent this observatory can bring out that evidence base including from the grassroots level would be incredibly well appreciated. So I think that I'm really interested in seeing what comes out there. Going to what our US priorities are on loss and damage this year I won't spend too much time or any time sharing with you the support that we're providing for various initiatives. They're similar to the ones that were raised prior to in previous interventions. I might just focus on our, as a member of the transitional committee what our priorities are with respect to these funding arrangements. And I would say that for us, this notion of what's going on inside the UNFCCC and what's going on outside of the UNFCCC we are thinking about the task at hand with these funding arrangements as both as the Sharma Shake decision on loss and damage funding arrangements says these new funding arrangements that we decided to establish include funds, processes and initiatives both inside and outside the Paris Agreement and the UNFCCC. So things like act allowance, global shield and other initiatives I think are part of what should be considered when the transitional committee is considering elements of the funding arrangements. So those funding arrangements include a fund of course but also include funds, processes and initiatives outside the process outside the Paris Agreement and UNFCCC. So I just wanted to share that in terms of our own framing. The way in which we're looking at the task with respect to the funding arrangements including fund is looking at various buckets or categories of what has emerged in the loss and damage particularly in the addressing loss and damage space and by buckets or categories I mean like things like humanitarian assistance, recovery and reconstruction, displacement and migration and other issues related to human mobility is another bucket, disastrous financing which includes the global shield and includes insurance and includes also safety nets and social protection are part of that DRF bucket. And then there's another category which is more apples and oranges but still quite important to understand the landscape and that is around slow onset events and non-economic losses. So when we are looking at these various buckets what we're trying to do is understand what are the gaps in each of these spaces? What are the gaps? What are the challenges that are being faced by countries? And then what are the gaps that we think the funding arrangements should fill? And then finally, how should the funding arrangements fill those gaps? Which gaps could be filled, should be filled by the existing system or existing institutions or funding institutions processes, funds and which ones should be filled by this new fund? And so through that gap analysis and landscaping analysis and analysis of also what the solutions are I really do think that there's a lot to be learned from the countries that are going through and being supported by ACT Alliance and really understanding what are the gaps and issues that countries are facing and the priorities that countries are identifying. With respect to the fund itself a couple of questions that we are asking ourselves are what, one question is what, what would the fund fund? The other question is who and within the who it is to whom and from whom. The to whom is as previous speakers raised the importance of the fund focusing on the particular, these funding arrangements focused on the particularly vulnerable. Will we be this year having a conversation of what that means specifically? So to whom, what does particularly vulnerable who is that set of countries? Then even when not thinking about countries themselves it is communities, especially communities in fragile or conflict countries or in emergency situations. How are we envisaging the support of this fund for those communities? And in a way where we are protecting and maintaining the safeguards that we find incredibly important. There's also the from whom was raised earlier about the donor base but also innovative sources of funding come in here. There are issues of also how the fund would be working and how disbursements would be made and then where, where would this fund sit? Are all important questions for us to be figuring out this year in 2023 for us to deliver on the COP 28 mandate and all of that is to say the work of ACT Alliance the practical solutions that come out will be quite important in informing that international process. Thanks. Thank you so much Christina. And hopefully we'll be initiating work quickly on this alliance so that we can come back to you with more form answers on those questions. Next I'll invite Lauren, senior advisor department for climate and environment section for nature and climate Norwegian Agency for Development and Cooperation. And I'll really request all the speakers going forward to please stick to three minutes. Okay, thank you very much. I hope you can hear me. Good afternoon, good evening everyone. And many thanks for inviting me to speak at this important event. I'm especially happy to speak at an event in Bangladesh even though speaking remotely because Bangladesh as it was mentioned also earlier is often praised for its work with disaster risk reduction especially linked to the effects of climate change. And I wanted to mention that Norway is currently supporting a project in Bangladesh through the platform for disaster displacement which is looking at the effects of climate change on displacement and how these can be addressed. And through this project, we hope that Bangladesh will have a better understanding of displacement in the context of climate change as loss and damage and will also be in a better position to enhance action and support for measures aimed at averting, minimizing and addressing displacement related to the effects of climate change. And this event is very relevant in terms of this project and I would be happy to put IED for example in touch with our partner. And Norway is also through a meteorological institute supporting the National Hydromet Institute in Bangladesh to develop models for improved weather forecasting as a basis for early warning systems. Early warning systems are important to reduce risks to lives and poverty due to extreme weather events as also emphasized by the UN secretary general in his early warning systems for all initiative which is also supported by Norway. And climate change is a top priority in the region development policy. At COP26 in Glasgow, the Norwegian government pledged to double Norwegian climate finance by 2026. And as part of this to at least triple our adaptation finance. And loss and damage is included in this increased funding to climate change as highlighted in the Norwegian strategy on climate change adaptation. Loss and damage is also a focus of Nourad's portfolio on climate resilient societies. Norway has endorsed the principles for locally led adaptation which we believe are key for addressing loss and damage. And we would also be interested in hearing about the links between the work done by IED and Life AR and the work that they're planning to do in all act. And Norway through Nourad is in the process of expanding its work on climate resilience within its portfolio including on addressing loss and damage. Support to innovative financing solutions such as through the climate disaster risk financing but also support to social safety nets programs like it was mentioned also by another speaker are two areas we're looking at in particular. And we are aware of the limitations of some of these programs and as such we're aiming at supporting a variety of interventions. And we believe that an initiative such as all act could be useful to provide insight into local needs and adapted solutions to bring forward much needed knowledge like many others also have mentioned from different contexts and also on how to address both economic and non-economic losses and also to provide feedback to us from work that we support through multilateral partners. We would like to congratulate you with the launch of this initiative and we look forward to hearing more about the initiative in the future. Thank you very much. Thank you so much Lauren. Next I'd like to invite Dr. Ben Ibrahim, Senior Advisor of Climate Finance, New Zealand Ministry for Foreign Affairs and Trade. Great. Thank you all. Thank you all for joining me and I will continue this conversation. Thanks very much for inviting me and providing me this opportunity to speak and hello from the middle of the night in Aotearoa, New Zealand. It's very late, but I'm here because of how important this topic is for us. In our region, the Pacific vulnerability to the impacts of climate change is acute. Loss and damage is a present day reality and it's a substantial threat as Christopher from Vanuatu has already explained so powerfully. Additionally, in recent weeks in our North Island, Tikau Maui, we have been ravaged by a series of climate-filled storms as well which is a developed country we're still grappling with. So climate change impacts have very much on our mind and we know how much worse and serious it is for SIDS and LDCs. So when we looked at the All Act Initiative and this event, what really appealed to us was its focus on the immediate term, on the now because we know loss and damage is occurring and we know there are funding gaps and yes, while the systematic negotiated work is required to enable the full suite of funding arrangements, we don't need to wait to begin addressing loss and damage. We see it in front of us every day. I think climate finances can and should be providing finance to fund activities to address loss and damage today. That's part of the reason why at COP 27, we announced 20 million from our climate finance as an initial specifically tiered contribution for loss and damage and this will build on work we're already doing to support specifically approaches on climate mobility, post-cycle and rebuilds, parametric insurance but it will mark the beginning of a more targeted approach to loss and damage as part of our climate finance strategy moving forward. And we also really appreciate All Act's focus on SIDS and LDCs, which aligns with our view that loss and damage finance needs to focus first on the most vulnerable, as many others have said today. Other parts also align with key elements from our international climate finance strategy. One of those is our preference for again being partner-led. This means we stand alongside our partners to fund their priorities and strategies that they themselves have determined as well as supporting locally-led and community-designed initiatives. So as we will be engaging with our partners in the Pacific to understand their priorities for allocating our loss and damage finance, we know the needs are great and we know already there are very real gaps to plug especially for slow onset events and non-economic loss and damages such of culture and language. And in here, I see a real potential value for All Act in supporting SIDS and LDCs to identify and articulate their loss and damage needs and coordinate that finance for them at both the community and national level. And I think as Christina mentioned as well, integrating with those existing national mechanisms that have been developed, whether it's through LifeAR and other programs that I know different countries are using to build climate finance coordination hubs in country. So work like that, I think will certainly assist countries like us to deliver our loss and damage finance as effectively as possible. In the long-term, we know we need a multifaceted solution to loss and damage, come and seeing financial, technical, legal and social solutions. I think it probably seems logical for All Act to be a partner with the Santiago Network for loss and damage once it's up and running, but at the same time, it's absolutely right to not be waiting. Diverse loss and damage finance needs will need different funding approaches. We know that different types of finance structures are needed for cyclones versus slow onset events. We know insurance products have a role, but they have limitations as do multi-lateral funds. They all have their strengths and weaknesses and the complexities go on, but ultimately leading from the front, mobilizing finance funding immediately, All Act can play a really important role when generating those lessons that we can feed up into those processes as other speakers have mentioned. So that's a little bit of perspective from Aotearoa, New Zealand. Thank you again to all the organizers for this invitation to speak. As much to be done to deliver effective finance for loss and damage, but we're glad to be part of a community that's committed to doing so. Tena koutou, tena koutou, tena tato koutou. Thank you so much, Ben. Next, I'll call Yamit Dagme, Director of Climate Justice, Open Societies Foundation and again, requesting all speakers to keep to three minutes. Hi, thank you very much. First, thank you for the opportunity to be there and my thoughts are going to the people of Banuatu that's also following the popular form Malagascar and unfortunately, the list is just getting too long. She's also why we are here. But I would like to welcome, to join all Producers speakers to welcome and congratulate these initiatives which I see being driven by effectiveness and it reminds us that actually the first to act and who know what to do are the local people. It's about empowerment of the local communities in this diversity and it's about complementarity with existing initiatives. We don't start from scratch. You know, we've mentioned a lot, the transition of how it can provide in both the transitional committee for loss and damage fund and also the Santiago network, but to broader platform, including to all the evidence base who we know and Chris know that better, are needed even for advisory opinions. And it's about learning, observation, but also doing and capacity building, you know, remaining for sure. I think there's still a bit of a gap feeling that we intend to leverage from these initiatives for effective governance. You know, how to mobilize effectively the right triggers local actors, you know, not just government, but indigenous marginalized communities, but also the national institutions, national sustainable institutions like universities, you know, those institutions use for early warnings as well, but also the partners on the grounds for effective mobilization of resources, distributions of resources and learning for how to make the best of triggers to test triggers for systemized, effective responses. These initiative aligns very well with OSF strategies and our people centered approach. You know, we have decided to go down on supporting impacts, you know, adaptation and loss and damage, the financing, it's covering how to best finance this impact as part of just transitions to resilience society. The issue of forced displacement is particularly important, you know, for us, as well as the protection of climate and environmental defenders. Looking forward, I'm really excited to work with all the donors that have expressed their interest, you know, to work and to support these initiatives to make it a success and to maximize the tremendous learning and actions coming from our grantees and partners. Thank you. Thank you so much, Yameed. I would also like to mention that there are other philanthropies who have also actively supported our effort in the last over three years, such as CECG, Rockefeller, and so I would definitely want to mention them as well, but I have been a horrible moderator and which means that we will have to extend this event by 10 minutes and I hope the online participants could continue joining us. I next invite our partners and networks who have been not only an active supporter but active contributor to all these efforts that we've done so far, especially very active support that we've received from Youth Coalition on loss and damage, REAP, CDP, and others. So I'll first invite Dr. Animesh Kumar, who's the head United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction, UNDRR-born office. Great, so I would not take a lot of time but just start with congratulating ACAD and IID for the launch of the All Act Initiative, which from its intended objective will support the developing vulnerable countries through partnerships, practicality and paradigm shifts which are so much needed as of now. After years of call to action on loss and damage, the last few years have seen some very rapid advancements. First through the launch and operationalization of the Santiago network and then with establishment of the loss and damage funding arrangements. So I must say that we have very exciting times ahead and as we move towards both the formal processes and what happens outside the domain of negotiators and as the loss and damage agenda advances from just being a political issue to a substantive and technical issue, we would soon be confronted with some basic questions. First, do we know how much and where we are losing? Second, do we have the right policy environment to avoid minimize and address loss and damage? And third, is our financial ecosystem ready to implement these actions? So starting with data and matrix and loss and damage, which is a very necessary element for a number of reasons, not least of which is clearly identifying the scale and impact of loss and damage. A clear link with initiative being launched is the knowledge network to be built. So building on existing knowledge domain will be helpful. For instance, definitions, methodologies, matrix being used in disaster reseduction could be a good starting point rather than Google. I'm happy to inform that UNDRR together with other partners like UNDP and WMO is in the process of establishing a loss and damage tracking system. This will replace our existing system, which it has been there for the last 25 years and being used by 110 countries generating official statistics on loss and damage. So stay tuned as updates on its progress will be announced as we head into COP28. And very happy to work on with or lacked on this initiative as well. Secondly, enabling policy environments can make or break action or loss and damage. And the operationalization of the loss and damage funding arrangement should speak clearly to this, but the all act initiative again can likewise leverage this collaborative approach to be used to identify barriers and potential solutions. As we have seen and hear hard many times today as well a comprehensive risk management approach is needed as a holistic measure to ever minimize an address loss and damage. And a combination of the first two points that I mentioned would tell us that just looking for new or more resources will not work. And this brings us to the third point. Financing arrangements for loss and damage is a complex issue and therefore one that requires a deep dive. Notable are the international financing institutions many who have traditionally provided development support, but are not acknowledging the intrinsic link between climate change impact and development prospects. COP28 hence will be critical in building these principles of financing and building the basis for the next COP29 that will be the finance COP, but it will also be useful to see that how the existing funding instruments including those of adaptation, disaster reduction, risk transfers, et cetera, feed into loss and damage funding discussions. I would like to conclude by stating that the challenge we are trying to address is a complex one and necessitates all of us to look beyond the framework of the convention. Many of the solutions may be shaping up in other related domains. The climate change and disaster reduction agendas have evolved in parallel over the last several decades governed by often be linked intergovernmental processes. This has led to duplicative planning and implementation in countries resulting in suboptimal utilization of resources. The loss and damage agenda works as a binder of these complementary agendas and I would be fully supportive of the all act initiative to make this happen. Thank you very much. Thank you so much, Dr. Namesh. Next I'll call Inezah from the Green Fighter Youth Coalition on Loss and Damage. Inezah, always good to hear you. Thank you so much. First of all, I would like to take this opportunity to thank this initiative because I believe that from having a tangible hope of what can be looking as a concrete action to address some damage within the UNFCC to also see how different actors, stakeholders are going to be invited on the table and design their solution, their own understanding. I think this is kind of the new era that we should step all into. And I don't want to take too much time because I already know we are behind time and people have been sharing some good insight. But for me, I really believe that as we are embracing the value that all actors bring on the table, we should really understand that there's a really need to define what the action to address loss and damage. And this should be in all the contexts. Women, children, youth should all be the actors and they can define the solution. And the other is to really tackle on the issue of accessibility because every solution is going to be coming forward. We do not want to repeat all the past mistakes because now that are available, people have been sharing their concern around accessibility for quite some time. But now we are also living in the era where youth are the stakeholders. I would like to share the fact that within the Loss and Damage Youth Coalition, we worked with our partner and we've been able to fund 11 youth-driven action to address loss and damage within their context. So these are the modalities we should be looking for. How does the community define addressing loss and damage and how do they differentiate it with adaptation? Because in some instance, adaptation, loss and damage action can overlap. But if you allow the community to really pinpoint to you in their own context, you'll be knowing where to start and when to end. And the other is really to really amplify the role of the actors outside the UNFCC because I believe that we need action to start now. But unfortunately, we are in the era where everything should be politically driven. But I do believe that with the more pressure coming from outside, more solution, more willingness to take risk in this kind of format of taking action to address loss and damage is what we really calibrate the political momentum that we want and we'll be able to achieve the vision and outcome we want both inside the UNFCC and outside the UNFCC because at the end of the day, we all want action now and we are really losing time if we are trying to really define all the policies around we should be more into defining what the action, what it means of accessibility and also the time of addressing. I mean, the time for accessing those finance. And I thank you so much. I hope you can hear me. Yes, and thank you so much. And next, I'd like to invite Ben Webster, who's the head of Secretariat Risk and Forms Early Action Partnership and who's also been an active advocate for anticipate reaction and early warning for all. Or to you, Ben. Thanks so much, Ritu. And thank you for the invitation to participate. I'm sorry I can't be in Bangladesh with you tonight. But Bangladesh has been a real leader in this space for many years now. It was actually her excellency Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina who launched the Risk and Forms Early Action Partnership at Uncast in 2019. And it's great to see Bangladesh continuing leadership in this space. I guess in the interest of time, just to summarize some of the areas of mutual interest for all act and the Risk and Forms Early Action Partnership. Again, we are an initiative that's looking for real world practical implementable solutions. And as you referenced, Ritu, we're interested in early and anticipatory approaches so people really can take action ahead of the impacts of climate change before the hazards strike. And therefore, there are three areas that I'll pull out briefly today where we can look to collaborate and explore together. One has been mentioned previously, but these people-centered approaches in our most recent state of play report, looking at where we stand in terms of early warning and early action and how we can scale up. We've identified a need to really prioritize people-centered approaches, not looking only at instruments and technology, but how we can really put people at the center and secondly, moving to regional, national and local level discussions and implementation. How can we turn the global rhetoric and dialogue into regional, national and local level solutions? So please do read the report and we look forward to collaborating with you on this run. Secondly, behind those approaches, if it's going to take a whole toolbox and early warning, early action is one of the approaches within that toolbox, but how can we achieve complementarity and alignment with the financial resources behind that, with the funding instruments and financing mechanisms to really implement those approaches? And again, a recent report has identified ways that we as a partnership want to scale up those approaches. So we look forward to working with all of you in terms of diversifying the resources available and achieving better complementarity and synergies so that we can really move to scale. And finally was one of the points that Animesh mentioned just there around more comprehensive climate and disaster risk management approaches. We have a whole work stream around integrating climate change adaptation, disaster risk management, the policies, plans, legal frameworks at the national level. So again, we look forward to working with the All Act Alliance and bringing these different pieces together so that we have a very solid foundation where we can move to scale and really get the resources down to the local level where required to avert, minimize and address the losses and damages that people are experiencing right now. But thanks again for the invitation and we look forward to continuing the dialogue. Thank you so much, Ben. And I'll next invite Daniel Clarke who's the Director Center for Disaster Protection. Hello, Ritu, thank you so much and I hope you can all hear me well. Good afternoon and good evening to everybody in Dhakaon online. The Center for Disaster Protection focuses on disaster risk finance and in particular the question of how to arrange the money before disasters to fund better and faster response, something that obviously speaks to the All Act agenda. So I'd like to look at the initiative through a pre-agreed finance lens. I'd like to make two points up front. Firstly, pre-arranged finance focus is particularly on the event-based impacts such as flooding and drought. Loss and damage obviously goes beyond this. And secondly, pre-agreed finance for event response is obviously only one piece of the jigsaw of climate financing measures needed to meaningfully address losses and damages. All Act approach, All Act focus on bringing together different funding sources and actors in a coordinated and complementary way speaks directly to this and I welcome it wholeheartedly. So with this in mind, I'd like to make three comments which actually reflects things that have already been said. Firstly, the focus on the most vulnerable. So All Act explicitly recognizes the need for loss and damage finance to be tailored to the vulnerabilities of different people and places. Disaster risk finance instruments provide the opportunity to engage with affected communities about how their understanding of risk or about their understanding of risks they face and to collaboratively consider how support systems can best deliver to meet their needs in advance of disasters rather than trying to have all these conversations in the middle of a disaster response. Secondly, local by default at the heart of All Act's proposal is the drive to create locally owned, locally led and locally accountable solutions to tackle loss and damage from the bottom up. Too much of the international system is built to up to deal with ad hoc post-disaster funding and there often isn't the time or space to engage meaningfully with local actors. Because disaster risk finance solutions are designed ahead of shocks, they can offer the chance to develop relationships and processes with local actors with unparalleled levels of access and insight and to foster locally led and locally owned solutions. Disaster risk finance systems offer the opportunity to put more power in the hands of those on the frontline of climate shocks and we must take this opportunity. And then finally on learning by doing All Act calls for the creation of an actionable agenda on loss and damage built on a foundation of data and evidence. And we already heard about the importance of practical solutions. Disaster risk finance systems are already up and running in multiple settings and for a range of hazards. All Act could play an important role in galvanizing these initiatives to share learning of what does and as importantly doesn't work and why and to draw on this rich source of learning. It's clear to me listening to the discussion today that All Act will play an important role in pushing forward a more intentional proactive approach to climate driven disaster risks that most that those most exposed to the impacts of loss and damage at its core. I look forward to working with you to deliver on these aims as the initiative goes forward. Thank you. Thank you so much, Daniel. And lastly, I'd like to call Kazi Amdadul Haq, who's from Friendship Anju and also part of Start Network. And because you are here, I can really request you to finish off quickly. Good evening. So I'm not going to address anyone. Congratulations for this great initiative. I must say, first of all, that is we are in a cross route, one list to hope and dignity and another loss in damage. And we need to choose which one we'll take forward. And in the very beginning, let's think about IFRC, you know, indicates in coming days, you know, the humanitarian needs will be double, almost 200 million. And here in Bangladesh Start Network, you know, conducted a study and analyzed seven years data indicated 12 million annual could be affected, potentially affected. 19 million could be project, could be, you know, the project, could be exposed to the climate risk. In this critical situation, I believe the humanitarian, particularly local actors can bring changes. And there are huge experiences, we made changes. And I would take this opportunity to share Start Network, is a financial services of Start Network. And that what we had, we actually pre-positioned funding in the respective countries. At the same time, we helped with the local people to prepare advance the planning, requirements and the whatever the essentials needed. And that actually in the, we launched in 2022 and the first year, we cross across 10 countries, eight countries for 10 climate risk. And the most importantly, that we realized the funding gap 17 million between what they requested and what the capital held that clearly indicates the importance and urgency. And it run by a governance committee, which I'm chair at this moment. And I would conclude by saying, Start Network, you know, experience and suggest the funding, what going to humanitarian responses, 55% predictable, but only 1% currently we could organize in advance that we can't accept, that we can't accept. And I must say, I would, we all galvanize our support behind all that to optimize our experience, knowledge, resources towards the urgency of loss and damage. All the best. Thank you. Thank you very much, Mdad. And it's now my pleasure to thank all our international participants for being with us at very awkward hours. We appreciate that. It's not easy to do a global meeting without some people having to get in the middle of the night. We appreciate that. So on my behalf, I'm not going to take more time. I'll say thanks and I'll invite Tom to say a few words, but I'll ask our Bangladeshi audience in the room to stay on for a further conversation, which is a Bangladesh based conversation, not a global conversation. So far we've been doing a global launch, which as you see with many, many partners from all over the world. But since you're in the room here and you've taken the trouble to come here, we would like to hear from you. Please do stay with us for a little while and then stay for dinner as well. Dinner will be downstairs in the restaurant. So Tom, would you like to just say a few words to conclude for our international audience? Thank you. Thank you, Selim. Just very briefly, I wanted to say a couple of big thanks. Big thanks, certainly, to the team at ICAD for hosting us today and for all of the hard work in the organisation. The team here has really worked wonders to put this together at fairly short notice and with such a global scope, great to be able to host people from all parts of the world. So a significant thanks. And also to the team at IID as well for working behind the scenes similarly, but particularly to Ritu Barrowach for really spearheading this initiative on IID's behalf. And I think you'll join me in thanking her and the rest of the team for excellent moderation today and being able to pull off something with truly global scope. Thank you very much.