Hill Heat

Subcommittee hearing on U.S. foreign policy priorities in East Asia and the Pacific and the FY 2024 Budget Request.

Witnesses:

• Daniel Kritenbrink, Assistant Secretary, Bureau of East Asian and Pacific Affairs, U.S. Department of State
• Michael Ronning, Acting Deputy Assistant Administrator, Asia Bureau, U.S. Agency for International Development

For East Asia and the Pacific, USAID’s FY 2024 budget request includes $279.3 million for climate, which is a $108.8 million increase, or 64 percent, over the FY 2023 request. The FY 2024 request emphasizes the Administration’s priority of addressing climate change by reducing emissions, protecting critical ecosystems, implementing legal and regulatory reforms, mitigating resource conflicts, helping nations transition to renewable energy, and building resilience against the impacts of climate change. There is significant demand for this support from our partners across the region. The FY 2024 request includes a significant increase for regional programming on climate adaptation in IPEF countries. With this funding, USAID will be able to respond to IPEF partners’ priorities, as articulated in the course of the IPEF negotiations, to help them implement IPEF commitments and grow their economies, as well as the economy of the United States. We will support them in climate change adaptation through investments in agriculture systems and food supplies, nature-driven solutions, resilient cities, and investments in climate-friendly infrastructure, in alignment with the Partnership for Global Infrastructure and Investment. Across the region, USAID will enhance climate change adaptation and mitigation by improving access to, and use of, information and tools that can help countries slow, stop, and reverse rapid deforestation, improve land and natural resources management, and prepare and respond to the impacts of climate change. USAID will support net-zero energy grid development in Asia by promoting power sector reforms, supporting the deployment of stateof-the-art energy systems and technologies, and modernizing power grids. With FY 2024 resources, USAID will help our Pacific Islands neighbors realize their own ambitious climate adaptation and mitigation goals by advancing the adoption of renewable energy sources, increasing access to infrastructure that is resilient to a changing climate, and strengthening early warning systems for climate-induced disasters. To promote transformative adaptation and resilience solutions, FY 2024 resources will help more residents to adopt climate-smart livelihoods and mobilize additional climate financing. Since 2016, USAID has mobilized more than $500 million dollars for Pacific Island countries from international climate finance institutions and supported local institutions to receive full accreditation to directly access international climate finance. With FY 2024 resources, USAID will also improve the performance of energy utilities, increase transparent private sector investments in the energy sector, and expand off-grid clean energy systems in Pacific Island countries. In addition, the request will allow USAID to boost the resilience of communities around the region so that they can keep working and earning a living—despite the negative impacts of climate change. In Vietnam, for example, USAID will use FY 2024 resources to protect the landscapes and biodiversity that agricultural communities depend on. We will continue to develop sustainable, climate-smart livelihoods, building on success creating jobs in parks, conservation zones, and watershed protection areas as well as in ecotourism. In the Philippines, which the 2022 World Risk Index ranked as the country with the highest disaster risk, USAID will improve the coping capacities of vulnerable communities in the face of disaster and capitalize on the use of climate-smart technologies to advance U.S. leadership in addressing climate security, as well as food security. USAID will also continue to engage our partners in the region and identify adaptation needs in Pacific Island countries, where extreme weather and shifting climate patterns pose an existential threat. Although collectively these nations contribute less than half a percent of global greenhouse emissions, they are on the frontlines of the struggle against climate threats.