It’s autumn once again, and the cold Berlin wind is blowing outside.

The Federal Foreign Office is hosting this COP briefing together with the German Climate Consortium and the Stiftung KlimaWirtschaft.

Business as usual? Same procedure as last year? No.

After all, the new Federal Government took up office six months ago – and this also includes a new team as regards our efforts to tackle climate change.

Instead of the Federal Foreign Office, the Environment Ministry will take the lead at the COP in the future.

But that doesn’t spell the end to our commitment, the commitment of the Federal Foreign Office and our colleagues at our missions abroad, to combating climate change and pursuing our climate foreign policy at this Ministry.

Climate change is, at the end of the day, a global problem, an existential threat to our security and our livelihoods.

For many of our partners, climate change and its impacts are the ultimate existential challenge – this was evident from many of the speeches, and I also witnessed this first-hand during many conversations, at the UN General Assembly in New York in September.

Climate change is thus a threat that requires us – as the Brazilian COP Presidency puts it – to engage as part of a “mutirão”, a “joint effort”.

There is no one in this Federal Government who does not feel committed to this joint effort.

Does this mean that everything will simply stay the same?

No.

But the difference between our country’s democratic parties doesn’t lie in the objectives set out in the Paris Agreement or our commitment to climate neutrality by 2045.

Rather, it lies in what we consider to be the best way, the best strategy, to get from the current status quo to that point.

Our coalition agreement states that “we want to become climate-neutral while remaining an industrialised country”.

And, to my mind, the best way to achieve this is to focus more on competitiveness and technological innovation once again rather than only on regulation.

Because the energy transition – and climate policy in general – can only be successful if it enjoys the support of the population.

And this means, in very practical terms, if energy is affordable and if jobs and resilient value-added chains are created.

But what role does climate policy play in the foreign policy of this government?

I believe that it has a threefold function.

Firstly, climate foreign policy addresses a tangible and daily threat to our security and thus to our freedom and our prosperity.

It’s not just me who says this.

The President of the Federal Intelligence Service said as much as well, reaching the assessment in February that climate change is one of the five biggest external threats facing Germany.

We’re witnessing how extreme weather events in many places around the world are exacerbating conflicts over resources and intensifying movements of migrants and refugees.

We’re witnessing droughts that are impacting water levels in the Rhine and Panama Canal alike – and which are thus jeopardising the reliability of trade routes, which are also the foundation of our prosperity.

And so the instruments of our climate foreign policy protect us ourselves.

After all, regardless of whether we combine private and state funds with the Investing for Peace Initiative in order to stabilise fragile states.

Whether we reduce emissions also beyond Germany’s borders through our partnerships.

Whether we invest funds from the International Climate Initiative in climate adaptation and conflict prevention in the Kenya-Ethiopia-Somalia tri-border region.

Prevention is always less expensive than dealing with impacts.

By engaging to safeguard our climate and our energy transition, we are addressing a security threat.

But, by the same token, a sensible climate policy and an energy transition geared towards operational feasibility increase our resilience.

Russia’s war of aggression in Ukraine has shown us that renewable energies and the diversification of our supply chains strengthen our security and sovereignty.

A decentralised energy system that flexibly combines different forms of energy generation is more resilient than a single fossil fuel power plant on which millions of households depend.

Just ask our Ukrainian friends.

This is another reason why we’re committed with our energy diplomacy to the energy transition and a diversification of energy imports and raw materials supply chains around the world.

Canadian Minister of National Defence David McGuinty recently said the following at a NATO conference in Montreal: “Investing in our ecosystems [… ] is strategic preparedness. It is national defence. It’s natural security.”

I couldn’t agree more.

But climate foreign policy isn’t only an important part of our security policy.

It also, and this is my second point, opens the door to new and stronger strategic partnerships that we need.

Quite a few states face the realistic scenario that parts of their countries is sinking into the sea as a result of climate change.

It goes without saying that I’m thinking of the small island states in the Pacific. But not only them.

Indonesia, a country consisting of 17,000 islands and a power centre in the Indo-Pacific region, made climate change a core issue of its G20 Presidency in 2022.

My point is this: climate change is an acutely existential issue for many of our key partners already today.

In a world in which we’re seeking new partners, where we have to stand up for our geopolitical positions and where we want to diversify our trade relations, it would quite simply be a strategic disadvantage for our diplomacy if we had nothing to offer as regards the climate issue.

At the UN General Assembly, it was very important that we are chairing the UN Group of Friends on Climate and Security together with Nauru.

That we are supporting the efforts of small island states such as Tuvalu to digitalise their cultural heritage.

That we are on the ground as points of contact with our Core Climate Embassies.

All of this is not only an important and appropriate response to climate change around the world, but also prudent and strategic diplomacy.

And, last but not least, our climate foreign policy is also foreign trade and investment promotion.

If we as the international community want to tackle the threat posed by climate change, then we need not only renewable energy systems, but also a circular economy, water systems and sustainable forestry and agriculture.

And when I say on my trips that we in Germany have something to offer here, then that, to my mind, is the best possible use for “Made in Germany”.

Three German companies are global leaders in electrolysis: thyssenkrupp nucera, Siemens Energy and Sunfire.

Clean technologies account for eight percent of Germany’s export volume already today. And this is a gigantic, growing market.

Our country is associated with top quality around the world – cars, mechanical engineering, chemicals. If in a few years from now the attributes “clean” and “renewable” are even more naturally associated with this, then we haven’t just strengthened Germany as a business location.

Then we’re contributing to a task that concerns humanity as a whole.

I have set myself the goal of making my own humble contribution to economic development here – and have impressed this upon the Federal Foreign Office since day one.

Ladies and gentlemen,

A new government, a new team and, in certain respects, a new strategy.

But, above all, a new tone and goal-oriented pragmatism.

This is what defines our government’s climate policy. This is what defines our climate foreign policy.

I’m happy that we have you, our country’s experts and our international partners, by our side in the search for the best path ahead – open, critical and constructive and with the utmost dedication to this cause.

With the utmost dedication to this joint effort: mutirão.

Thank you very much.