Nadi, Fiji: The Pacific Association of Supreme Audit Institutions (PASAI) is facilitating the training of Pacific Island and Caribbean auditors to participate in ClimateScanner, a global assessment of government actions related to climate change.
Twenty-two staff (13 female, 9 male) from the government audit offices of American Samoa, Australia, Fiji, Guam, the Marshall Islands, New Zealand, Palau, Tonga, Tuvalu and Vanuatu are in Nadi, Fiji for the 5-day face-to-face workshop from 24 to 28 June 2024.
United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) is funding the participation of almost half of the audit staff attending from the Pacific Islands.
Ten staff from national and territorial audit offices in the Caribbean are also attending, having travelled from Antigua and Barbuda, the Bahamas, Grenada, Jamaica, Montserrat, Saint Lucia and Saint Kitts and Nevis.
The ClimateScanner initiative is focused on evaluating government efforts to address climate change through a rapid review tool. With data consolidated at the global level, relevant information will be accessible and inform future audit work on climate issues.
Similar workshops have already been held in the European and Latin American regions and more will follow in Asia, Africa and the Middle East.
Participants will apply the ClimateScanner methodology to partially complete assessments of their respective jurisdictions during the workshops.
Subject matter experts are instructing participants on the tool’s key components of governance, public policies and climate finance. Although the auditors come from offices with different mandates, they share a common mission to provide independent assessments of the use of public resources and the performance of public policies.
By finalising the results in the coming months, the International Organization of Supreme Audit Institutions (INTOSAI) aims to show a comprehensive picture of the state of government action in climate change at the Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (COP 29) in early November 2024.
The keynote speaker for this week’s training was Karlos Moresi, Programme Adviser & Team Leader, Climate Finance & Resilience at the Pacific Island Forum Secretariat. The Head of Community Research & Ethnographic Solutions Mapping, UNDP Pacific Accelerator Lab, Dr Mohseen Riaz Ud Dean; and the Permanent Secretary for the Fijian Ministry of Environment and Climate Change, Dr Sivendra Michael both delivered presentations covering the Pacific context.
Auditor-General of Fiji, Finau Nagera; PASAI Chief Executive, Esther Lameko-Poutoa; Auditor-General of Montserrat, Marsha Verancia Meade; and a representative from the Federal Court of Accounts of Brazil, Junnius Marques Arifa also made remarks at the opening ceremony on Monday.
The workshop facilitation team includes senior staff from the Federal Court of Accounts of Brazil and the Office of the Auditor-General of New Zealand.
The Federal Court of Accounts of Brazil, as current Chair of INTOSAI, has made additional information about the ClimateScanner project available online.
PASAI acknowledges the support of UNDP, the New Zealand Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade (MFAT) and the Australian Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT).
-----END----
Contact information:
Esther Lameko-Poutoa, Chief Executive PASAI, Auckland, New Zealand
E: secretariat@pasai.org P: +64 9 304 1275
