Khalid Al-Falih

:: Saudi Oil Minister Khalid Al-Falih has said oil-exporting countries such as Saudi Arabia are an integral part of the solution to tackle the challenges of climate change and its adverse economic impacts, according to the Saudi Press Agency (SPA).

Al-Falih is leading Saudi Arabia’s delegation to COP23 in Bonn. In his foreword posted on the Kingdom’s official website for COP23, he said: “Saudi Arabia hopes that the ‘era of implementation’ marked by COP23 will further clarify the frameworks that will make the agreement to provide the support for all nations to achieve their climate-change goals.”

While the Paris Agreement has already entered into force, the Ad Hoc Working Group on the Paris Agreement (APA) and the permanent subsidiary bodies continue to work toward completing the work program under the agreement.

“Saudi Arabia will actively endeavor to ensure the outcomes of this work will be ready for consideration at COP24 in Poland in 2018,” he said.

He said the Paris Agreement represented an opportunity to respond to the potential threat of climate change to economies and societies globally.

“While the world is working on the suite of solutions to deliver more energy with fewer and ultimately no GHG (greenhouse gases) emissions, Saudi Arabia is confident that the seeds planted and nurtured through this and previous COP sessions will continue to flourish and bear fruit through communication, cooperation and innovation to which we all wholeheartedly commit,” he said.