Speaker 1: Welcome to zero. I am Akshatrati this week climate hope
Speaker 1: from a sinking island. I'm in sunny Barbados this week
Speaker 1: attending the Sustainable Energy for All Global Forum in the
Speaker 1: country's capital, Bridgetown. It's my first time here, but I've
Speaker 1: long waited to visit, not just for the beaches, though
Speaker 1: they are nice, but for a climate reporter like me.
Speaker 1: The bigger draw is the Prime Minister of Barbados, Mia Mottley.
Speaker 1: She's held the office since twenty eighteen, and in that
Speaker 1: time she's come to be known as a singular force
Speaker 1: in raising the voice of climate vulnerable countries and in
Speaker 1: helping find new solutions for them. She has set ambitious
Speaker 1: emissions targets for Barbados, laid out plans to conserve vast
Speaker 1: tracks of its oceans, and championed the use of clean power.
Speaker 1: But perhaps her most impressive achievement is that she's found
Speaker 1: inventive ways to change the conversation on climate finance. For example,
Speaker 1: last year, Barbados was able to replace expensive loans by
Speaker 1: cheap ones because Motley convinced lenders that it would be
Speaker 1: to their benefit. That's because the savings will be put
Speaker 1: toward making the country more resilient to climate change and
Speaker 1: thus improve the country's financial health in the long run.
Speaker 1: Barbados has also successfully negotiated clauses in its loan agreements
Speaker 1: that allow it to pause repayments if the country is
Speaker 1: hit with an extreme weather event. She's also looked for
Speaker 1: creative ways to fund climate adaptation. This week, her administration
Speaker 1: released its new budget. It will see a fund for
Speaker 1: resilience and regeneration that will be supported by a point
Speaker 1: two five percent salary contribution from all workers in Barbados.
Speaker 1: Take a listen to something that Raphaele Soul, a lawyer
Speaker 1: and business consultant, had to tell me about this fund.
Speaker 2: I see it as a way of us showing up
Speaker 2: our country's infrastructure, making sure that our systems have the
Speaker 2: necessary redundancies, so that of course in the cases of
Speaker 2: natural disasters, but generally speaking, as we're building our country
Speaker 2: from a development perspective, we're going to be able to
Speaker 2: have the safety net. We need to make sure that's
Speaker 2: done well.
Speaker 1: As you can hear here in Barbados, climate change isn't
Speaker 1: just a side issue. It's the issue, and Motley has
Speaker 1: used the learnings from her country to help other vulnerable
Speaker 1: countries to deploy these solutions. The Bridgetown Initiative, which she
Speaker 1: launched at COP twenty six in twenty twenty one, puts
Speaker 1: old and new financial tools to creative use. So when
Speaker 1: I had the opportunity to interview Prime Minister Motley on
Speaker 1: stage at the Forum this week, I jumped at the chance.
Speaker 1: In this episode of Zero, we are bringing you that conversation,
Speaker 1: as well as some parts of the speech she delivered
Speaker 1: at the Forum.
Speaker 3: The beautiful thing about the game of cricket is that
Speaker 3: you learn early that you have to play on the
Speaker 3: pitch as it is not as you would like it,
Speaker 3: and Barbados has perhaps produced more global cricketers of excellence
Speaker 3: per capita than any other part of the world. I
Speaker 3: apologize to my brothers in Gernada and Trinidad and elsewhere,
Speaker 3: even in India. But in learning that, it learns that
Speaker 3: we play on the wicket as it is not as
Speaker 3: you would like it, and you don't spend time or
Speaker 3: energy crying over what could have been, but we deal
Speaker 3: with the world as it is. On the twelfth of
Speaker 3: March twenty twenty five, I therefore ask us to use
Speaker 3: this opportunity to make the partnerships to perfect the networks
Speaker 3: that will help us unlock the financing that is critical.
Speaker 3: I also ask us to recognize that as small states,
Speaker 3: or as developing states, mimicry does not get us very far.
Speaker 3: If we try to establish regulatory structures that are known
Speaker 3: to the North Atlantic world, whose systems of development and
Speaker 3: whose institutions are completely different, we find ourselves, as my
Speaker 3: own country has done regrettably in the last three and
Speaker 3: a half years, caught up in regulatory arbitrage that has
Speaker 3: done nothing other than to lock off and block off
Speaker 3: over half a billion dollars of investment in renewable energy
Speaker 3: that is waiting and exploding to be put into action.
Speaker 3: And I share this with you because I'm sure that
Speaker 3: if we can learn from each other and do not
Speaker 3: have to repeat the mistakes of each other, we will
Speaker 3: get much further ahead. The reality is that most of
Speaker 3: our markets are way too small to command the attention
Speaker 3: of even commercial providers, far less to be talking about
Speaker 3: the things that are necessary to distort competition or to
Speaker 3: avoid corruption. We lose is time, and what we lose
Speaker 3: is the benefit of curtailing and increase in temperature globally.
Speaker 3: What we lose is an inability to build the resilience
Speaker 3: that we need. Our own Energy Transition Investment Plan contemplates
Speaker 3: that Barbados will reach net zero by twenty thirty five.
Speaker 3: We are committed to that goal, but we equally recognize
Speaker 3: and we've had to go to Parliament twice to change
Speaker 3: legislation to start to streamline what would otherwise be complex
Speaker 3: processes that have already delayed US three and a half years.
Speaker 3: So long as we can satisfy ourselves of the public
Speaker 3: purpose and be aware of the public mischief, we then
Speaker 3: have to find new ways that are appropriate to size
Speaker 3: and institutional maturity to be able to help us advance
Speaker 3: the execution of these targets that we have set ourselves.
Speaker 3: And I believe that if we can create, as I said,
Speaker 3: the international platform that can de risk investments, that will
Speaker 3: allow for South south cooperation, that will allow for the
Speaker 3: creation of guarantees so that we can better access domestic savings,
Speaker 3: so that they too can be part and parcel of
Speaker 3: the community that benefits from the rewards that would otherwise
Speaker 3: be available only to establish capital, that we can create
Speaker 3: a win win who shared.
Speaker 1: Partnerships after the break More from Barbados and by the way,
Speaker 1: if you've been enjoying this episode, please take a moment
Speaker 1: to rate and review the show on Apple Podcasts and Spotify.
Speaker 1: It helps other listeners find the show. I'm minister, thank
Speaker 1: you for that speech, and thank you especially for making
Speaker 1: time during this week when the budget discussions are going on.
Speaker 1: I recognize how valuable this time is that you're spending
Speaker 1: on at the four. Let me start by the message
Speaker 1: you had in your speech about practical and feasible solutions.
Speaker 1: One of the things that the Bridgetown Initiative and many
Speaker 1: of the projects that you mentioned around dead spots, for
Speaker 1: final resilience, for ocean conservation, for having a resilience fund
Speaker 1: where employees pay into it here in Barbados, those are practical,
Speaker 1: feasible solutions now in the years of effort that you
Speaker 1: have put in to try and develop these solutions in
Speaker 1: this moment where we are seeing a backlash on climate
Speaker 1: policies all around the world, be that in rich countries
Speaker 1: like the US where Donald Trump has pulled the US
Speaker 1: out of the Barrass Agreement, be that in Europe that
Speaker 1: is committed to climate action but is now being forced
Speaker 1: to spend heavily on defense and thus shrinking the fiscal
Speaker 1: space it has for climate investments. What do you think
Speaker 1: are the lessons that you have learned from these solutions
Speaker 1: that developing countries should be taking on board right now?
Speaker 3: As I said, I think we have to start at
Speaker 3: home first. On Monday, the Minister in the Ministry Finance
Speaker 3: delivered the budget speech for our government, and in addition
Speaker 3: to employees and self employed persons contributing quarter one percent
Speaker 3: of their earnings to a resilience and regeneration fund, we
Speaker 3: have now asked employers to match the contributions of the
Speaker 3: employees and we've gone further, and I have been inspired
Speaker 3: by Germany quite frankly in so doing. Last week the
Speaker 3: new Chancellor of Germany made it absolutely clear that whatever
Speaker 3: it takes to keep his country stable he will undertake,
Speaker 3: and that he would be reviewing the fiscal rules, particularly
Speaker 3: with respect to military spending. Our Parliament has now before
Speaker 3: it a statement from the Minister in the Ministry of
Speaker 3: Finance that we will now commit to add every year,
Speaker 3: starting from this year, a quarter of one percent of
Speaker 3: GDP in a regeneration and resilience fund, and that we
Speaker 3: will amend our fiscal rules to be able to accommodate
Speaker 3: that commitment on an annual basis. Because climate is for
Speaker 3: us an existential crisis, and we start therefore with what
Speaker 3: we can do for ourselves. I've then adverted to what
Speaker 3: we can do regionally. We have in this region six
Speaker 3: billion US dollars in excess liquidity, excess domestic liquidity. On
Speaker 3: its own, it may be difficult to employ, but in
Speaker 3: partnership with guarantees, whether from the European Investment Bank or
Speaker 3: other entities, all of a sudden that can be leveraged
Speaker 3: to be able to secure far more funding than is
Speaker 3: currently available now, so that we can finance much of
Speaker 3: our own development. I am sure that the same obtains
Speaker 3: in Africa, the same obtains in the Pacific, the same
Speaker 3: obtains in Latin America. What we have now to explore
Speaker 3: is whether the cross border flows south south can also work,
Speaker 3: because the rail problems have come north south. In determining
Speaker 3: what are the risk and what is the lack of
Speaker 3: information that would otherwise preclude us from being able to
Speaker 3: have access to affordable interest rates for capital that is
Speaker 3: used or pooled, we need to create opportunities for each other,
Speaker 3: and I genuinely believe that that is entirely possible. I'm
Speaker 3: also not, however, distracted by the fact that the US,
Speaker 3: as is their right, has withdrawn from the Paris Agreement.
Speaker 3: But at the level of the federal state, as we
Speaker 3: keep hearing in the US, there is a clear division
Speaker 3: between what they do and what is done at the
Speaker 3: level of states and what is done at the level
Speaker 3: of municipalities. And I think you will find that a
Speaker 3: number of municipalities and a number of states are still
Speaker 3: investing their money in green energy, in green bonds, and
Speaker 3: therefore there will continue to be a strong financial pool
Speaker 3: of funds available for good, credible investments. I make one
Speaker 3: last point on mitigation. It doesn't matter where mitigation takes
Speaker 3: place in the world, it just needs to take place.
Speaker 3: And we need, therefore to find a way of creating
Speaker 3: a global fund that can finance the most efficient and
Speaker 3: effective mitigation projects, because if we are not going to
Speaker 3: have the power of one or two countries behind what
Speaker 3: we are doing, then in my own country, there's an
Speaker 3: old saying, one one blow is kill old cow. One
Speaker 3: one blow is kill old cow. And what it simply
Speaker 3: means is that one by one, by one by one,
Speaker 3: we can effectively still achieve what we need to achieve
Speaker 3: if we were to take the cumulative domestic excess liquidity
Speaker 3: of the global South and start to determine how we
Speaker 3: can work with strategic partners, whether it is Europe, whether
Speaker 3: it is China, whether it is India, whether it is Brazil,
Speaker 3: regardless whether it is the Gulf States, we will then
Speaker 3: begin to recognize that we have access to a lot
Speaker 3: more than we are actually currently aware of.
Speaker 1: One thing that came up in other speeches as well
Speaker 1: as yours is the need for financing. And many of
Speaker 1: the examples that you have secured here in Barbados have
Speaker 1: relied on some amount of support from development banks. We
Speaker 1: talked about the importance of guarantees in enabling these solutions
Speaker 1: to happen. Now I hear from people who are in
Speaker 1: development banks there is a sense of fear that with
Speaker 1: the US, which is amongst the largest shareholders in development banks,
Speaker 1: that there will be pushback against anything that has labeled
Speaker 1: climate as we are seeing already in the legislation in America.
Speaker 1: So if development banks are supposed to play such a
Speaker 1: crucial role in guaranteeing access to finance for developing countries
Speaker 1: toward climate resilience, how do you go about getting that
Speaker 1: finance development banks don't play the role that they have
Speaker 1: played for Barbados.
Speaker 3: Well, the first thing is that they must stop letting
Speaker 3: fear be a paralyzing emotion, because if they do that,
Speaker 3: then they'll realize that they can use the capital that
Speaker 3: they have and they can work together with others in
Speaker 3: guarantees to leverage it to be able to unlock far
Speaker 3: more than it would otherwise unlock. At this point in time,
Speaker 3: I remain, as I said, optimistic, because I believe that
Speaker 3: we have not really scratched the surface between what we have.
Speaker 3: The problem is is that we're also trying to secure
Speaker 3: what we know we will need down the line. But
Speaker 3: sometimes you have to stop a start with what you
Speaker 3: have where you are, while building up the capacity to
Speaker 3: achieve what you need three five, seven, ten years from now.
Speaker 3: And that sense of ultimate pragmatism and the blinkered approach
Speaker 3: that does not cause you to spend your energy and
Speaker 3: emotion in fear but actually causes you to be able
Speaker 3: to and lot what you have is what I think
Speaker 3: is required in this moment. I also think that let
Speaker 3: us be real, the United States is driven not just
Speaker 3: by presidential directives. Or governor's directives or congressional directives is
Speaker 3: driven by commerce, and there are companies that are going
Speaker 3: to find that they will be outside of the opportunities
Speaker 3: with respect to the procurement that must take place for
Speaker 3: the green energy transition. Every single export import bank in
Speaker 3: the world has some kind of domestic interests by ensuring
Speaker 3: that their suppliers of products and services benefit from any
Speaker 3: concessional funding that is given. That's not going to change
Speaker 3: overnight in the US, so I am prepared to wait
Speaker 3: for the medium to long game and to recognize that
Speaker 3: those persons who are going to be left out of
Speaker 3: the equation will soon find a ward as to how
Speaker 3: to get back in on the issue of the green
Speaker 3: energy transition. And let us be also very clear, the
Speaker 3: United States has been an engine of scientific and engineering
Speaker 3: innovation and therefore I expect that those people will also
Speaker 3: not want to be left out of what is the
Speaker 3: most important scientific and engineering innovation that is necessary globally.
Speaker 1: One more question around politics around the world, not just
Speaker 1: in the US, is that we have seen in election
Speaker 1: after election that there is issues beyond climate action that
Speaker 1: are the focus for people. So cost of living crisis, inflation,
Speaker 1: where people think they are paying too much or aren't
Speaker 1: getting a good deal from government. But as you've done
Speaker 1: with the Resilience and Regeneration Fund, where you have contributions
Speaker 1: coming from employees into the fund, how do you make
Speaker 1: that case? How can other developing countries make that case
Speaker 1: to their people that climate action is in their economic
Speaker 1: interest so that they can win elections and act on
Speaker 1: this problem.
Speaker 3: Human beings know that they can't only live for what
Speaker 3: is necessary today, but they're building towards the future. The
Speaker 3: reason we educate children is not that we expect them
Speaker 3: to get all the knowledge in one year. It's a
Speaker 3: process and it's no different in this respect. Similarly, we
Speaker 3: all know and there's the old adage that I use
Speaker 3: repeatedly with my people here, many hands make like work.
Speaker 3: And if we don't recognize that all of us have
Speaker 3: a role to play, then we are not being truthful
Speaker 3: nor faithful to our people. The reality continues every person,
Speaker 3: through their actions and through their contributions financially, however small,
Speaker 3: however large, have a role to play in confronting is
Speaker 3: really a crisis of humanity because the planet on which
Speaker 3: we live, the only livable planet that we know, is
Speaker 3: in fact at risk now. I don't even want to
Speaker 3: say luckily, but the truth is that the last five
Speaker 3: years have shown us enough climate disasters globally where ordinary
Speaker 3: people have either lost their lives or livelihoods that anyone
Speaker 3: who is thinking will realize that this is not just
Speaker 3: a coincidence or a quirk of nature, and that we
Speaker 3: are in a pathway that will in fact put all
Speaker 3: of us at risk. We used to say in the
Speaker 3: Caribbean all the time, Simon would tell you that we
Speaker 3: are the canaries in the mind. Regrettably, those who were
Speaker 3: watching on now know that this is not a joke
Speaker 3: or this is not a problem for SIDS somewhere elsewhere.
Speaker 3: The majority of the North Atlantic countries, and indeed the
Speaker 3: emerging market economies China, India, Brazil all have coastal communities
Speaker 3: and coastal cities that are going to be significantly put
Speaker 3: at risk. In Africa, when you fly over and you
Speaker 3: see the big brung swath of land that is inhospitable
Speaker 3: to development and farming, you then begin to better appreciate
Speaker 3: why there may be issues of insecurity permeating the continent
Speaker 3: if people can't guarantee to their citizens simple things like
Speaker 3: making a living, like being able to farm, like being
Speaker 3: able to access water, like being able to withstand the drought.
Speaker 3: So I am very very clear that in the same
Speaker 3: way we tell our children what is good for them
Speaker 3: and how to be able to prepare themselves, to grow up,
Speaker 3: how to manage risk. They learn not to touch fire
Speaker 3: from early, they learn how to cross a road, they
Speaker 3: learn how to do basic things. Why are we frightened
Speaker 3: for having these conversations with our population when in truth
Speaker 3: and in fact, it is their actions and their contributions
Speaker 3: that will help us scale up to make the difference.
Speaker 1: I want to ask you two small questions. One is
Speaker 1: that as you've heard people around the world wait to
Speaker 1: hear what you have to say. I've been to cop
Speaker 1: meetings and when there's a list of people who are
Speaker 1: going to speak, everybody rushes to hear Prime Minister Motley speak.
Speaker 1: The reason is twofold one. You bring moral leadership and
Speaker 1: you bring feasible solutions. We talked about the feasible solutions,
Speaker 1: but the moral leadership at this time matters more than ever.
Speaker 1: You've talked about how the Caribbean needs to be seen
Speaker 1: and heard when there are such loud voices around wars,
Speaker 1: around economic distress, around trade wars happening around the world.
Speaker 1: How do you keep the moral leadership a focus in
Speaker 1: this conversation.
Speaker 3: By remaining resolute and saying what you believe and what
Speaker 3: you stand for. Look, I just gave you the example
Speaker 3: of methane. The fact that others will find potentially an
Speaker 3: opportunity for cooperation in controlling methane by stopping the flaring
Speaker 3: of gas and by fixing gas pipes does not cause
Speaker 3: me to change my fundamental beliefs as to why I'm
Speaker 3: asking them to do it. So that we don't change
Speaker 3: who we are, but we find opportunities for collaboration and
Speaker 3: partnership where there exists, and then where there continues to
Speaker 3: be divide, we continue the conversation to see how best
Speaker 3: we can work together to bridge the divide.
Speaker 1: And the last question, You've been warning for many years
Speaker 1: that the world today looks a lot like a century ago. True,
Speaker 1: that it's imperial, that there was in nineteen eighteen pandemic
Speaker 1: that killed tens of millions, that it followed a great depression,
Speaker 1: then it followed a world war, and the horrors that
Speaker 1: came from the Nazi regen in the twenty first century.
Speaker 1: We've had a pandemic, We've had financial crisis. There are
Speaker 1: wars now in Africa, in the Middle East, in Europe.
Speaker 1: And to add to all that, we have climate change
Speaker 1: that we didn't have one hundred years ago. So one
Speaker 1: thing I know everybody here would like to hear, how
Speaker 1: do you make a case for hope today?
Speaker 3: Hope is a human condition that's necessary for me to
Speaker 3: take my next step. And I don't think that we
Speaker 3: should ever believe that hope is impossible because our current
Speaker 3: reality is difficult. If that were the case, my brother
Speaker 3: President Bio would not be here today talking to me,
Speaker 3: because slavery would have insisted that we don't exist anywhere
Speaker 3: in this country. So I want to remind people that
Speaker 3: hope is a condition that we choose, and we choose
Speaker 3: it irrespective of whether our difficulties are great or small.
Speaker 3: If we remember that, then we will also remember that
Speaker 3: resilience is what buttresses and gives hope its best chance,
Speaker 3: which is why we are working in the way in
Speaker 3: which we are working. So I truly believe that you
Speaker 3: have to choose hope. And if people choose hope as
Speaker 3: was as it was chosen by generations before who face
Speaker 3: even greater personal turbulence, even if not planetary crisis. Then
Speaker 3: I think we shall make the journey.
Speaker 1: Thank you very much, thank you, thank you for listening
Speaker 1: to Zero and now for the sound of the week.
Speaker 1: Even the frogs and Barbados are nice. They don't croak
Speaker 1: but whistle. If you like this episode, please take a
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Speaker 1: someone who loves beaches. You can get in touch at
Speaker 1: Zero pod at Bloomberg dot net. Zero's producer is Miight Lira.
Speaker 1: Bloomberg's Head of podcast is Sage Bauman, and head of
Speaker 1: Talk is Brendan newnam Our. Theme music is composed by
Speaker 1: Wonderly Special. Thanks to Kanika Chawla and Sherry Kennedy at
Speaker 1: Sustainable Energy for All, and to Shawan Wagner and Jessica
Speaker 1: beck I am Akshra Drati Back soon.