Prime Minister the Hon. Philip Davis delivered the national statement at the COP31 conference in Antalya, Turkey on Thursday.

Mr. Davis stressed the need for countries to enact legal frameworks that ensure continuity, accountability, and lasting action on climate change.  He said, “there’s never been a shortage of willing leaders; every COP produces them.  They stand at this podium.  They make the pledge and they mean it then there’s an election or a coalition collapses, a new government arrives with new priorities and amnesia.  Excellencies, we have been building a global response to an existential crisis based on individuals’ goodwill. But individuals come and go; that is the flaw at the heart of everything we have done.”

The Prime Minister urged world leaders to focus on permanence in their decisions to ensure lasting impact.  “Permanence means that financing must be automatic, not merely pledged.  Permanence means that commitments must be enshrined in treaty and law, not just declarations and communiqués. And permanence must mean that we must embed the special circumstances of small island developing states as a structural fact and not just a category that has to be reargued every decade.”

Mr. Davis also spoke about the potential of the vast seagrass meadows in The Bahamas.  He said, “we have already made a significant investment in establishing the scientific, legal, and fiscal framework.  We now need international partners to fully implement the program who will stay the course, whose commitment is not dictated by donor cycles or ideological trends.  For a generation, the world has looked at small island states and regarded us as first to follow.”

The Prime Minister is expected back in the country on November 13th.