A storytelling talanoa centring Pacific communities, women and girls on the frontlines of loss and damage, and calling for justice centred responses that recognise the lived realities of climate harm. This storytelling session will centre Pacific women, girls, young people and frontline communities whose lived realities show that loss and damage is already reshaping lives, lands, oceans, cultures and futures. Grounded in science, Indigenous knowledge and community testimony, the session will bring together Pacific civil society, and community partners working on loss and damage to share stories, evidence and advocacy from across the region. It will include emerging insights from community-led research in Kiribati, Solomon Islands, Fiji and Bougainville, led by the Pacific Islands Climate Action Network in partnership with Kiribati Climate Action Network, Solomon Islands Climate Action Network, and Plan International, alongside the work of other Pacific actors. The talanoa will connect lived experience with climate science, recognising that every tenth of a degree above 1.5°C deepens the risk of irreversible harm for Pacific communities. Speakers will reflect on the gendered and intersectional realities that are too often missed in loss and damage discussions, and what these realities mean for the Fund for Responding to Loss and Damage, the IPCC, in calling for the implementation of the ICJ Advisory Opinion on climate change, and reaffirmed in the UN General Assembly resolution. The session will also explore why non-economic loss and damage must be recognised in its full cultural, spiritual and intergenerational dimensions, including the reality that some losses cannot be monetised.

Venue

Moana Blue Pacific Pavilion

Speakers

Pacific Islands Climate Action Network, Plan International, Pacific Students Fighting Climate Change, Young people (tbc)