(Bab Ighli, 10th November 2016) It’s the fourth day of COP22 and I’m truly treasuring every single moment of it. Attending YOUNGO and CAN meeting, as well as helping out at the Malaysian Pavilion is a daily routine. Having the opportunity to attend G77 and China’s sessions, sitting through the Ad-Hoc Working Group on the Paris Agreement (APA) agenda reporting, Conference of the Parties serving as the meeting of the Parties to the Paris Agreement (CMA1) informal meetings, and the technical briefing on Nationally Appropriate Mitigation Actions made my day. I regretted not being able to attend the youth session organised by the Secretariat of the UNFCCC on Youth and Future Generations Day. It was definitely a miss. However, MYD2016 managed to meet up with youth from other Asian countries, such as Singapore, Taiwan, the Philippines and China.

The APA and CMA1 informal sessions both in general lack of progress as most of the time, parties are demanding clarification and they’re conservative in proposing means to carry the meeting forward. Nevertheless, the APA informal meetings agenda on mitigation, adaptation communication, transparency of framework and support, global stocktake (GST) and implementation facilitation were accomplished although there was numerous reiteration by parties to avoid doubling the work from SBI and SBSTA. In the GST informal meeting, non-paper tools were provided as a guide for discussion. However, it was not well-received among the developed countries. There were also parties raising concerns over the matter of mandate to discuss the subject prior to the opening of CMA1 on the second week of the conference.

Thanks to the opportunity to join the informal meetings, I’ve observed that many countries are represented by not just experienced negotiators, but also young negotiators. Exposure to YOUNGO and meeting up other youth attendees at the conference have also given me the opportunity to be acquainted with many young party delegates. They are trained and equipped with technical knowledge about the climate negotiation. In the long run, this may be an advantage for the countries or blocs that these young negotiators or future negotiators represent when they take over the negotiation responsibility in the future.

The technical briefing of NAMA, together with the Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) registry provided by the Secretariat of the UNFCCC gave an overview understanding and it could be accessed via the following web address:

1. NAMA Registry
2. NDC Registry

The day ended swiftly and I really treasure the exposure and opportunities presented at COP22. It was also a day to celebrate as Australia finally announced the ratification of both the Paris Agreement (PA), and the Doha Amendment.

Written by Kelvin Diong
Edited by Choy Moon Moon