GEF-PAS: SLOW PROGRESS IN PREPARING NATIONAL PRIORITIES

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 02 SUVA 000482

SIPDIS

SIPDIS

SENSITIVE

BANGKOK FOR REO AND USAID

COMMERCE FOR NOAA

MANILA FOR ADB REP

E.O. 12958: N/A
TAGS: SENV EFIN EAID FJ TN NR TV KR GEF
SUBJECT: GEF-PAS: SLOW PROGRESS IN PREPARING NATIONAL PRIORITIES
SUBMISSION

REFS: A) STATE 136425 B) SUVA 463 C) SUVA 245 (NOTAL)


1. (SBU) SUMMARY: We contacted the countries covered by Embassy Suva
to encourage them to engage to the fullest extent possible with the
World Bank and other organizations to develop their Global
Environment Facility Pacific Alliance for Sustainability (GEF-PAS)
priority lists before the October 15 deadline, as instructed in
reftel A. There appears to have been slow progress to date in Fiji,
Tonga, and Kiribati. Tuvalu has prepared a draft submission. We
have not been able to reach anyone in Nauru. The World Bank still
has not finalized contracts with the consultants that were to have
provided assistance. Responsibility for coordinating regional
organization participation in GEF-PAS now resides with the South
Pacific Regional Environment Programme (SPREP),where the GEF
advisor says the Secretariat has been in touch with members to offer
assistance. The Pacific Islands applied Geoscience Commission
(SOPAC) has also reached out to its membership. The Forum
Secretariat does not see a role for itself at this stage in the

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process. End Summary.


2. (SBU) a World Bank regional consultant for GEF-PAS, Alan Resture,
who works at the University of the South Pacific in Suva, told us on
October 3 that the World Bank still has not finalized his contract
or the contracts of the other consultants. He can schedule meetings
but cannot actually travel without a signed contract, he said.


3. (U) Fiji: We called the acting permanent secretary of the Fiji
Ministry of Tourism and Environment, Manasa Sovaki, on October 1.
(Permanent Secretary Kaumaitotoya and Director for Environment Epeli
Nasome, who both attended the GEF-PAS meeting in Apia (reftel B),
are away this week: Kaumaitotoya on business in Switzerland and
Nasome on leave.) Sovaki was unaware both of an October 15 deadline
and of GEF-PAS itself. He requested information on the initiative,
which we provided by sending him a link to the GEF website and a
copy of the World Bank document. Resture, the World Bank consultant
assigned to Fiji, told us on October 3 that he has been in contact
with Environment Director Nasome on October 2, and has tentatively
scheduled the Fiji consultation for October 9.


4. (SBU) Kiribati: We spoke by telephone on October 1 with
Environment and Conservation Division Deputy Director Tess
Teariki-Ruatu. Asked about progress toward preparing Kiribati's
list of priorities for GEF-PAS funding, Teariki-Ruatu replied that
"things are not going well." Her division is having internal
consultations and discussions with stakeholders in the biodiversity
focal area this week, she said, but there has been no national-level
consultation yet. Teariki-Ruatu, who was also in Apia for the
GEF-PAS meeting, told us she had a number of questions on process
and funding levels. She said officials were consulting a visiting
UNDP team that is in Tarawa on other business and that she planned
to contact the SPREP GEF advisor. Her government had had no
assistance from the World Bank or other international or regional
organizations thus far.


5. (SBU) Tonga: Tonga's GEF operational focal point, Ministry of
Lands, Survey, Natural Resources and Environment CEO Dr. Nailasikau
Halatuituia is out of the country and will not return to Tonga until
next week. On October 2, we phoned Tonga's designated GEF-PAS point
of contact (and Apia-meeting participant),Ministry of Finance and
Planning officer Caroline Tupoulahi-Fusimalohi. She said her
government, which she noted is fully occupied with Pacific Islands
Forum leaders' meeting preparations, is struggling with its GEF-PAS
submission. She told us that officials have agreed to form a
national GEF interagency committee but have not yet adopted terms of
reference for it. Although a World Bank consultant is scheduled to
arrive in Tonga later this week to assist with national
consultations, it will be difficult to make any progress until
Halatuituia returns, she said.


6. (U) Tuvalu: In the absence of the Acting Secretary for Natural
Resources and the Acting Director of Environment, who are both out

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of the country, we spoke on October 3 with Tuvulu environment
department official Peputua Latasi. She told us that Tuvalu's
national GEF coordinating committee met last week to prepare a draft
submission. Latasi said that the World Bank consultant is scheduled
to arrive in Tuvalu on October 12. This will not leave much time to
finalize Tuvalu's submission, she said.


7. (U) Nauru: No one from Nauru attended the Apia GEF meeting.
SPREP GEF officer Joe Stanley told us that Acting Director of
Commerce, Industry and Resources Russ Kun is Nauru's point of
contact for GEF-PAS but Kun's office says he is out of the country
until next week. Because of telephone difficulties, we have been
unable to reach anyone else in the ministry. World Bank consultant
Resture told us that he too has been unable to make contact with
anyone in Nauru.


8. (SBU) Regional Organizations: Pacific Islands Forum Secretariat
Regional and International Issues Advisor Coral Pasisi told us on
October 2 that the Forum Secretariat has not accepted the
coordinating role with Pacific regional organizations in the GEF-PAS
process that was described in the "Next Steps" document the Bank
circulated on September 24. She said that she informed the World
Bank of this immediately and suggested that function should be
carried out by SPREP. Pasisi also explained that the Forum
Secretariat does not have a role in the national consultation

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process the Bank is leading. (She said that two weeks ago the Forum
offered the World Bank assistance from its staff to supplement the
efforts of Bank-engaged consultants, but the Bank never responded to
this offer.) She envisions the Forum Secretariat engaging at a
later stage to help identify on-going or planned regional programs
to count as co-financing for GEF projects. She shared her view that
most countries, with the help of Bank consultants, should be able to
assemble their lists of priorities by October 15. The real
challenge will come after that, she said, when the Bank tries to
coordinate production of the fifty or sixty Project Identification
Forms that will then be required.


9. (U) SOPAC Integrated Water Resources Management (IWRM) Project
Advisor Rhonda Bower told us on October 2 that SOPAC has been in
contact with GEF and IWRM country focal points to provide support
for their GEF-PAS submissions. Bower said she was hopeful that
countries would identify IWRM as a priority. SOPAC is proceeding on
the assumption that they will and has sent out invitations to
national focal points to participate in a third planning meeting in
November. (Reftel C reports on IWRM.)


10. (U) In a telephone conversation of October 2, SPREP's Stanley
confirmed that his organization, rather than the Forum Secretariat,
will take on the regional agency coordinating function during
preparation of the GEF-PAS submission. He added that he and other
SPREP staff were available to assist countries throughout the
process and that SPREP had sent out a notice to focal points to that
effect. So far, he said, four members had responded to the notice
to request assistance, which SPREP is providing.
DINGER