Haiti’s Environment Minister Joseph Jouthe says that “climate change is a very big terror in Haiti”, and without funds the Caribbean island nation is unable to adapt and mitigate against it. Credit: Desmond Brown/IPS

By Desmond Brown
MADRID, Dec 13 2019 (IPS)

Haiti’s Environment Minister Joseph Jouthe has compared the climate emergency to a violent act and appealed to the international community for help to fight climate change.

“Climate change is a very big terror in Haiti. It’s very hard for us to deal with climate change,” Jouthe told IPS on the margins of the United Nations climate summit, the 25th Conference Of The Parties (COP25), in Madrid, Spain.

“Haiti is not responsible for what’s going on with climate change but we are suffering from it. We want better treatment from the international community.”

Jouthe said Haiti remains committed to strengthening its resilience to climate shocks and to contributing to the global effort to mitigate the phenomenon.

Haiti is pursuing a four-fold objective in relation to climate change:

• promoting, at the level of all sectors and other ministries, a climate-smart national development;
• creating a coherent response framework for country directions and actions to address the impacts of climate change;
• promoting education on the environment and climate change as a real strategic lever to promote the emergence of environmental and climatic citizenship; and
• putting in place a reliable measurement, reporting and verification system that can feed into the iterative planning processes of national climate change initiatives.

But Jouthe said the country simply cannot achieve these targets without financial help.

“In Haiti all the indicators are red. We have many projects but as you may know [The Caribbean Community] CARICOM doesn’t have enough funding to build projects,” he said.

Patrice Cineus, a young Haitian living in Quebec, said access to funding has been a perennial problem for Haiti.

But he believes Haiti is partly to blame for the seeming lack of inability to quickly receive financial help.

“Haiti, my country needs to build evidence-based policies, and this will make it easier to attract help from the international community,” Cineus told IPS.

“If we don’t have strong policies, it’s not possible. We need research within the country. We need innovative programmes within the country and then we can look for financial support and technical support.

“We cannot have access to funding because the projects we are submitting are not well done. We don’t use scientific data to build them. They are not done professionally,” Cineus added.

Cineus’ theory appears to be substantiated by the Caribbean Community Climate Change Centre (CCCCC), which helps CARICOM member states address the issue of adaptation and climate change.

The centre’s Executive Director Dr. Kenrick Leslie said since 2016, under an Italian programme, it is required to develop projects that would help countries adapt to different areas of climate change.

“One of the areas that we have been considering, and we spoke with Haiti, is to build resilience in terms of schools and shelters that can be used in the case of a disaster.

“Funds have been approved but, unfortunately, unlike the other member states where we have already implemented at least one, and some cases two, projects, we have not been able to get the projects in Haiti off the ground,” Leslie told IPS.

“Each time they have identified an area, when we go there the site is not a suitable site and then we have to start the process again.”

While Haiti waits for funding, Dr. Kénel Délusca, current head of mission of a technical assistance project, AP3C, of the Ministry of Environment and Environment and the European Union, said the country remains one of the world’s most vulnerable to climate change.

Scientists say extreme weather events like hurricanes, floods and droughts will become worse as the planet warms, and Island nations like Haiti are expected to be among the hardest hit by those and other impacts of a changing climate, like shoreline erosion.

“The marine environment is extremely important to the Haitian people. There are more than 8 million people living in coastal communities in Haiti,” Délusca told IPS.

“There are more or less 50,000 families whose activities are based on these specific ecosystems. In other words, this is a very important ecosystem for Haiti and different levels – at the economic level, at the cultural level, at the social level.”

Haiti is divided into 10 départements, and Délusca said nine of them are coastal. Additionally, he said the big cities of Haiti are all located within the coastal zone.

“These ecosystems are very strategic to the development of Haiti. The Haitians have a lot of activities that are based on the marine resources. We also develop some cultural and social activities that are based on these environments,” Délusca said.

For poor island countries like Haiti, studies show, the economic costs, infrastructural damage and loss of human life as a result of climate change is already overwhelming. And scientists expect it will only get worse.

Though Haiti’s greenhouse gas emissions amount cumulatively to less than 0.03 per cent of global carbon emissions, it is a full participant in the 2015 Paris climate agreement and has committed to reduce its greenhouse gas emission by five percent by 2030.

Grenada has been spearheading the fight against desertification at local, regional and global levels. Credit: Desmond Brown/IPS

By Desmond Brown
ANKARA, Jun 18 2019 (IPS)

Businesses are being encouraged to follow the lead of the youth to halt desertification, reduce degradation, improve agricultural sustainability and restore damaged lands.

“The youth is a very particular case. The youth give me a lot of hope because I see their passion, and I see their vision,” head of the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD) Ibrahim Thiaw told IPS.

“For the youth it’s basically ‘I care for the planet, this is our future.’”

Each minute, 23 hectares of productive land and soil is lost to desertification, land degradation and drought, according to U.N. Environment.

Thiaw said when this happens young people are forced to leave their homeland, and most never return.

He said restoring land will help in reducing risks of irregular migration – a major component of population change in some countries.

According to a new U.N. Department of Economic and Social Affairs’ Population Division report launched on Monday, Jun. 17, between 2010 and 2020, 14 countries or areas will see a net inflow of more than one million migrants, while 10 countries will see a net outflow of similar magnitude.

“What is left for the young girl or young gentleman of Haiti if 98 percent of their forest have been degraded and they have barren hills that cannot generate food anymore? What is left for them to do but to flee?” Thiaw questioned.

“Therefore, restoring land would reduce migration, it will keep people on the ground, help them generate their own income and live their own lives. They don’t want to leave their families. They migrate because they have no choice. So, restoring land is also bringing stability in our countries.”

Like Haiti, Grenada – another Caribbean Community (CARICOM) member state – has seen its share of land degradation.

As countries observed World Day to Combat Desertification and Drought (WDCDD) on Monday, Jun. 17, Grenada’s Minister of Agriculture and Lands Yolande Bain-Horsford said while soils and land continue to play an integral role in the economic shift the island nation is experiencing today, these resources are under threat.

“The agricultural sector is a major contributor to national development through the provision of employment, household income, food and government revenues,” Bain-Horsford told IPS.

“As we boast of the importance of this sector to our economies, unfortunately we must face the harsh reality of the challenges facing the sector, which include land degradation, lack of sustainable farming practices, climatic variations and droughts.”

Bain-Horsford said Grenada has been spearheading the fight against desertification at local, regional and global levels.

Locally, the island nation has set ambitious targets to ensure it addresses and, in some cases, reverse the impacts of negative agricultural, construction, and other actions which lead to desertification.

Some of the actions taken include the Cabinet approving Grenada’s Voluntary Land Degradation Neutrality targets that should be achieved by 2030.

To achieve the targets, Grenada has agreed to;

• increase the fertility and productivity of 580 hectares of cropland by 2030, 
• transform 800 hectares of abandoned cropland into agroforestry by 2030, 
• implement soil conservation measures on 120 hectares of land by 2030, 
• the rehabilitation of 383 hectares of degraded land at Bellevue South in Carriacou by 2030, 
• the rehabilitation of 100 hectares of degraded forests in Grenada and Carriacou by 2030, and
• increase forest carbon stocks by 10 percent by 2030.

The island also completed and submitted its 2018 National Report on the state of land degradation, nationally linking it to gender and the Sustainable Development Goals 2030. 

But Thiaw said land restoration cannot be left in the hands of governments alone, explaining that it will not be sufficient.

With two billion hectares of land in need of restoration, the UNCCD head said the best solution would be for the governments to not only mobilise communities, but to mobilise private investments.

“As long as business does not see that investing on land and restoring land is a good business case, it will not happen,” Thiaw said.

“Governments will have to review some of the land tenure systems that they have. It may be just a concession saying if you restore this land, I will give you the concession over the land for the next 50 years or for the next 60 years. Then they can harvest and they will leave the land restored rather than leaving it barren.”

The government of Turkey is hosting three days of activities in observance of the 25^th anniversary of the UNCCD and the WDCDD.

Turkey’s Agriculture and Forestry Minister Bekir Pakdemirli said countries are facing a silent danger that constantly grows and threatens the planet.

“This danger is indeed more dangerous and more insidious than wars,” he said. “This danger that takes our lands away, makes them unusable and risks our future is nothing but desertification.”

Pakdemirli said just as desertification is a disaster that threatens the entire world regardless of national borders, degraded and destroyed lands pose a direct threat to the lives of people living on land-based activities.

He said these social problems sometimes force people to migrate, especially in countries such as Africa that are most affected by the consequences of desertification.

“Nobody wants to leave the land where they were born, grew up, and felt belonging to. Migration is a way to addressing the most desperate and needy situations,” Pakdemirli said

“In such cases, children and women are viewed as the most vulnerable category of victims. Therefore, before it is too late, we should take necessary measures before lands lose their productivity and become completely uninhabitable.

“While taking these measures, we must act in unison and adopt the principle that all lands around the world should be protected,” Pakdemirli added.

Ronald Jackson, Executive Director of the Caribbean Disaster Emergency Management Agency (CDEMA), told IPS in an interview that the ambitions around establishing strong early warning systems in the Caribbean date back to the early 2000s. Credit: Desmond Brown/IPS

By Desmond Brown
BRIDGETOWN, Mar 3 2019 (IPS)

Caribbean countries have been signalling their willingness to dedicate time and resources to implement and sustain effective multi-hazard early warning systems.

Most countries located in the hurricane belt face being impacted during the yearly Atlantic Hurricane Season. But all Caribbean countries face another challenge—climate change

Ronald Jackson, Executive Director of the Caribbean Disaster Emergency Management Agency (CDEMA), told IPS in an interview that the ambitions around establishing strong early warning systems in the Caribbean date back to the early 2000s.

But he said, “it still remains incipient, despite the fact that there has been some level of investment in the area over time.”

“I think Jamaica would have been the farthest advanced way back in the 90s with the Rio Cobre warning system which included a community warning infrastructure as well as telemetre gauges linked to the met offices and to the National Disaster Management Office,” he said

Jackson believes countries “have gotten more caught up . . . in the opportunities of climate change . . . and less so with advancing what is considered to be adaptation.”

The CDEMA head said his unit has been working with its partners to look at framing a common vision, recognising the need for a more comprehensive investment in establishing people-centred early warning systems at national level.

“We have so far delivered a solutions package for four of our members—Antigua & Barbuda, Dominican Republic, Saint Lucia and St. Vincent and the Grenadines—looking at their gaps and using that to define the priority areas for investment to establish these early warning systems.”

Excerpts of the interview follow:

Inter Press Service (IPS): What is the state of early warning systems in the Caribbean?

Ronald Jackson (RJ): We are trying to implement interventions around an integrated early warning systems agenda in all our 18 states by 2024, which is the sort of end cycle of this particular strategy. We’ve broken that up into bite size amounts from the point of view of how we are going to try to attract investments at a specific juncture over the life of that strategy, but by 2024 certainly to address the needs of the 18 [Caribbean Community] CARICOM member states as it relates to integrated people-centred early warning systems.

In Guyana for example, they don’t have hurricanes, but they do have flood issues which would require them looking at a flood warning system that is linked to tropical cyclonic events. A country not faced with challenges related to significant flood events may also want to look at their tsunami warning systems. So, we are targeting having a full system in each of our states by 2024.

IPS: What, if anything, would you like to see countries do differently?

RJ: We have gotten more caught up I would think in the opportunities of climate change, which is really the energy aspect of it, and less so with advancing what is considered to be adaptation. There is more of a heavier occupation on the opportunities of climate, which is good.

The opportunities are in the area of renewable energy and how best we can capitalise on that and I think it is a necessary process that we must embark on and embark on fully because of the benefits to be derived.

You can reduce the cost of energy, allowing you to release additional resources into areas of resilience building—one of which is early warning. But the area which is categorised as adaptation in climate change, which is where you will see people use the language more around risk reduction and prevention, is an area that has not gotten the same level of focus as the climate mitigation aspect which is where you look at clean energy, reductions of emissions and so on. That for us is where the greatest threat is. The human security element of climate change is where we should be focusing heavily because we’re talking about people being displaced. You’re talking about floods, you’re talking about the loss of livelihoods. That’s where the greatest threat for Caribbean Small Island Developing States (SIDS), and in fact any developing island nation, lies. They have to face the challenge of having limited land masses and resources and having that constantly being impacted by the changing climatic conditions—sea level rise, saline intrusion, water scarcity, flood conditions and other environmental and health related issues—all aligned to climate change.

IPS: Given the challenges Caribbean countries have been facing, could it be that there still exist some misconception regarding adaptation?

RJ: As it relates to adaptation, we seem to think a lot of the interventions required are new. They are not new, we’ve been grappling with those things that are packaged under the theme of adaptation for some time. These are largely programme areas at national level which if you look at the analysis they have never, in my mind, in the last 20 years or decade or so received very strong budget allocations. That’s what the analysis is showing us. There could be a lot of questions or reasoning around that. It could be how countries determine what are the main priorities of the day given the limited resources and the fiscally strangling environment in which they are operating.

IPS: Which takes us to the issue of funding. As is the case with almost everything else, procuring funds is an issue. What has been the experience of countries getting funds for sustaining Multi-Hazard Early Warning Systems?

RJ: There is programme support from international sources. The challenge there is that it’s been ad-hoc—either financing one element or two elements of the four elements of people-centred early warning. Part of it is also sustainability because there are different elements that exist. The problem also is, can you maintain the infrastructure? Can you replace the parts in a timely manner? So, there is also a sort of maintenance issue that is linked to budget allocation.

*Interview edited for clarity.

The idea for the Caribbean Climate Smart Accelerator was floated following the devastating 2017 hurricane season which saw two Category Five hurricanes that severely damaged a number of islands. Hurricane Irma left significant damage to public infrastructure, housing, tourism, commerce, and the natural environment in the British Virgin Islands. Credit: Kenton X. Chance/IPS

By Jewel Fraser
PORT-OF-SPAIN , Feb 26 2019 (IPS)

The Caribbean Climate Smart Accelerator launched last year June with the backing of Virgin’s Richard Branson has given itself five years to help the region become climate resilient.

Its CEO Racquel Moses, who was appointed in January of this year, told IPS the climate smart accelerator sees itself as an enabler in paving the path towards climate resilience for the region. “The horizon for the climate smart accelerator is just five years. We are meant to be a catalyst to get things started. Governments will have the ability to take things forward after that,” she said.

Their primary agenda during that five-year period will be to launch five major,“transformational” projects that will move the region forward towards becoming a climate smart zone, she said.

The idea for the accelerator was floated following the devastating 2017 hurricane season which saw two Category Five hurricanes that severely damaged a number of islands, including Necker Island owned by Richard Branson, and left scores dead.

In the wake of that devastation, an interim team comprising management of Branson’s charitable foundation, Virgin Unite, and Inter-American Development Bank staff members got together and hammered out the idea to make the Caribbean a climate smart zone, said Neil Parsan, public sector lead for the climate smart accelerator. They defined a climate smart Caribbean as one that “modernises digital, physical and social infrastructure to integrate essential activities that are climate adaptive, mitigative and secure a low-carbon future for the region,” he said.

Despite the Caribbean being responsible for less than five percent of global greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, its growth rate in emissions between 1990 and 2011 was three times the global average, according to a 2017 USAID report. So 28 governments in Latin America and the Caribbean have eagerly aligned themselves with the accelerator’s objective of making the region a climate smart zone, as have major institutions including the World Bank, the Organisation of American States, the Organisation of Eastern Caribbean States and the Caribbean Community, Parsan said.

Racquel Moses was appointed in January as CEO of the Caribbean Climate Smart Accelerator, an initiative backed by the World Bank and Virgin’s Richard Branson to make the region resilient in the face of climate change. Credit: Jewel Fraser/IPS

Moses said the accelerator was “working in tandem” with regional governments to coordinate activities related to climate change. “I have been surprised at how aggressively regional governments have been working on the issue of climate change. We are further along with some governments than with others,” she said. But generally, “they have been quite excited to get involved.”

The five transformational projects she is seeking to have completed over the next five years would also be carried out with governmental support, she said. To qualify as one of the five, a project has to be low carbon, make use of renewable energy, have an impact on a large number of people, be scalable across several countries in the region, create climate-related jobs, and have the potential to be exported outside of the region, she added.

Parsan said dozens of projects are currently under consideration, but the challenge for the Accelerator’s team was “being able to identify mature, bankable, investable, impactful projects that align themselves to the strategic goals of the accelerator.” Though most of the projects under consideration meet some of the criteria, all do not meet every single criterion.

Once the five major projects that the accelerator will be working on are identified, the team will need to source funding to help them get up and running. “We are actually working at putting together teams that can address this funding,” Moses said. She noted that Barbados’ Prime Minister Mia Mottley had expressed the desire to see a regional climate investment fund created that would bankroll climate change projects while giving investors a better return on their investments than the current market rate.

The accelerator’s team had met with managers of global funds “to find out legally how they work, and how to get multiple funders, multiple countries, multiple companies working together.” Though she declined to specify what types of projects are currently under consideration, for reasons of confidentiality, Moses said all projects identified must move the region forward to achieving its climate smart goals, including having a low carbon footprint.

At the same time, in the light of the region’s relatively small contribution to GHG emissions, the accelerator is also hoping to facilitate the region’s export of climate professionals whose expertise would have been developed while working on climate-related jobs in the Caribbean. Moses said the accelerator also wants to help provide grants for smaller, climate-related projects and will be announcing awards soon for some of these.

Momentum is continuing to build around the accelerator, Parsan said. “There is definitely an uptick and daily I am taking calls. A lot of interest comes from the Caribbean, which is great, a lot of young entrepreneurs. We also have a lot of U.S. companies expressing interest.” He said about 50 percent of the companies reaching out to the Accelerator are outside of the Caribbean, including some multinational companies. Among these Is AirBnB which was mentioned in the announcement of the launch as providing free housing to relief workers during natural disasters.

Energy companies also are reaching out to the accelerator. “They say they are perceived as being part of the problem. They ask, how can we be part of the solution?” Parsan said.

And though Moses does not believe being female helped her to get the top job, the accelerator is also concerned about issues of gender parity in the execution of its projects, she said.

Also on her wishlist as CEO of the accelerator is seeing the Caribbean play its part in reducing carbon emissions by becoming more energy efficient, and doing more to protect its marine environment.

But mostly, “the thing that keeps me up at at night is ensuring we are working fast enough…to make sure everything we do benefits the region,” she told IPS.

A fisher in Barbados. The Caribbean’s fish stocks have been affected by climate change. Credit: Desmond Brown/IPS

By Desmond Brown
GEORGETOWN, Feb 5 2019 (IPS)

In recent years Caribbean Community (CARICOM) countries have experienced escalated climate change impacts from hurricanes, tropical storms and other weather-related events thanks to global warming of 1.0 ° Celsius (C) above pre-industrial levels. And it has had adverse effects on particularly vulnerable countries and communities.

CARICOM countries and other small island and low-lying coastal developing states have long been calling for limiting the increase in average global temperatures to below 1.5 °C above pre-industrial levels by the end of the century in order to avoid the worst impacts of climate change.

Regional countries have also noted with grave concern the findings of the  Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Special Report on Global Warming of 1.5 °C. The report noted that climate-related risks for natural and human systems including health, livelihoods, food security, water supply, human security and economic growth are significantly higher at an increased global warming of 1.5 °C than at the present warming levels of 1 °C above pre-industrial levels.

Particularly worrisome for small island developing states (SIDS) is the finding that 70 to 90 percent of tropical coral reefs will be lost at a 1.5 °C temperature increase and 99 percent of tropical coral reefs will be lost at a 2 °C temperature increase.

Dr. Douglas Slater, Assistant Secretary General at the CARICOM Secretariat, told IPS that they have been working closely with the Alliance of Small Island States grouping. “The CARICOM SIDS grouping is considered a very important link and we are really leaders in the SIDS movement,” he said.

He said that at last year’s 24th Conference of the Parties (COP24) of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), the region had been able to ensure, to some extent, that the procedures for the implementation of the Paris Climate Agreement were clearly outlined.

Excerpts of the interview follow:

Dr. Douglas Slater, Assistant Secretary General at the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) Secretariat, says the region needs to recognise the importance of implementing some of the measures as recommended by technical institutions that will help to build climate resilience. Credit: Desmond Brown/IPS

Inter Press Service (IPS): How is the CARICOM region doing with its climate change fight?

DS: Starting from COP21 in France, certain decisions were made. The region thought that [at COP24] we needed to ensure that the procedures for the implementation of the Paris Climate Agreement and the modalities were clearly elucidated and outlined. To some extent I would say that that was achieved.

Another issue that we took [to COP24] and lobbied hard for, was a response to the IPCC 1.5 study.

The world is already looking to limit global warming to below 2 °C. We insisted that it should be no more than 1.5°C. Now, it might sound like they are close, but the differences are so significant, especially as it relates to us.

I must say that we had a hard task convincing them to accept the language of the findings of the IPCC. In fact, majority of the parties supported the findings and the actions to respond to it. But there were some major players [who did not] and because we work on consensus, it couldn’t find its way into the outcome document in a forceful way that was supportive of what we wanted.

There were four main countries, some real heavy rollers—the United States, Russia, Kuwait and Saudi Arabia—who resisted that. We will continue and there will be other opportunities. In fact, there is a meeting in May of this year where we’ll continue to push.

IPS: Were there any other tangible outcomes?

DS: We did get some language that will encourage parties to work towards what we want. There is also the issue of the Talanoa Dialogue, which was decided from the previous COP Presidency—Fiji. The word suggests working together in an inclusive cooperative way to ensure that a lot of issues, including the Nationally Determined Contributions, are adjusted to meet the times. That had some challenges being accepted wholesale too, but I think it is correct to say that Parties acknowledged what was happening and gave some commitment to increase the ambition to reduce greenhouse gases.

But it is a continuing struggle and we have to keep sounding our small but powerful voices because climate change is existential to us. Already, coming out of the hurricane season in 2017, we have had first-hand experience of what can happen to us and we don’t want a repeat of that.

IPS: Given the political cycle in the Caribbean where you could have a change in administration every five years or less, do you find that when an administration changes the drive and level of attention to climate change also changes?

DS: It is my feeling, based on my observation over the years, that the political parties in the region understand the impact that climate change can cause on us and in general are strongly supportive. So, it’s not a major issue. It might just be degrees of emphasis or so, but I don’t think there’s a challenge there. I think it is clear to all of our political leaders that climate change is a reality and it can devastate our sustainability, especially economic sustainability.

In my opinion, it doesn’t matter which administration is there, the policy should be aimed at addressing resilience to climate change and I think by and large that has been happening.

IPS: What major challenges remain for individual countries in the region or as a collective of SIDS? 

DS: I think we need to recognise the importance of implementing some of the measures as recommended by our technical institutions that will help to build resilience. Let us take hurricanes, for example. One of the reasons why you get significant damage is that the building codes that we have been using need updating. I think if we do that it will build a more resilient region. I think the message is there, but the implementation takes some time due to a lack of resources.

We have been working on that.

I know Dominica, especially post Hurricane Maria, are really working assiduously to build the first climate-resilient country probably in the world. That augers well for the region. We are hoping whatever we can gain from that experience can be disseminated in the entire region.

I am particularly concerned about some individual member states of CARICOM. Such as, for example, Haiti. I [bring up] Haiti because of land degradation and its impact, which we are dealing with now. We hope that Haiti can adjust to understanding the need for reforestation because that is a resilience measure.

I think if our individual member states can work with the various ministries and the regional institutions and we can mobilise the resources, that is the big challenge.

We know in general what we need to do. There’s a willingness to do it, the challenge is having the resources to.

We have some excellent institutions like CDEMA [Caribbean Disaster Emergency Management Agency] which really is on the ball, but they need resources sometimes to respond to some of the challenges.

We are working with some international organisations and some other international development partners to see how we can pull that together. But it’s a work in progress.

*Interview edited for clarity.

Excerpt:

In many parts of Dominica, Hurricane Maria razed the greenery, including agricultural cultivation, from the hillside of the mountainous island. Credit: Kenton X. Chance/IPS

By Kenton X. Chance
BRIDGETOWN, Oct 12 2018 (IPS)

If there is one lesson that Dominican Reginald Austrie has learnt from the devastation Hurricane Maria brought to his country last September, it is the need for “resilience, resilience, resilience”.

And it is not just because he is his country’s minister of agriculture.

When the category 5 hurricane made landfall in Dominica, Austrie, then the country’s minister of housing, was weeks away from harvest time at his two-acre farm where he had 800 plantain trees, in addition to yams.

“So, personally, I suffered some loss. But to me, my agriculture, while it is commercial, it’s not really my livelihood,” he told IPS on the sidelines of the 15th Caribbean Week of Agriculture (CWA), the premier agriculture event in the 15-member Caribbean Community (CARICOM), which is taking place in Barbados from Oct. 8 to 12.“For us, our own scientists warned us of the ravages with respect to drought, with respect to the destruction of our reefs, and by extension, our marine life." -- prime minister of Barbados, Mia Mottley.

“I experienced it, I saw it and I know how much it cost me; that I can never recover the cost of production and so I understand what the regular and ordinary farmer is going through, fully dependent on agriculture,” Austrie, who became minister of agriculture three months ago, said of the monster hurricane.

In addition to the destruction of his plantain trees, Hurricane Maria left several landslides on Austrie’s farm when it tore across Dominica, leaving an estimated USD 157 million in damage to the agriculture and fisheries sectors, and total loss and damage amounting to 225 percent of the nation’s GDP.

Austrie is taking steps to reduce the impact of future cyclones, which forecasters say will become more frequent and intense as a result of climate change.

“So now I had to look at terracing, I had to look at the plants I can grow between the terraces to hold up the soil and I have to really look at whether I want to continue doing plantains, whether I want to expand,” he told IPS.

Climate resilience in agriculture and fisheries was a feature at CWA.

The event opened on the day that the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) said, in its latest report, that limiting global warming to 1.5 degree Celsius above pre-industrialisation levels would require “rapid, far-reaching and unprecedented changes in all aspects of society”.

As part of their advocacy for a legally-binding global climate accord, small island developing states (SIDS) like those in the Caribbean, have been using the mantra “1.5 to stay alive”.

SIDS say capping global temperature rise at 2°C above pre-industrialisation levels — as some developed countries have suggested — would have a catastrophic impact on SIDS.

The IPCC’s latest report says limiting global warming to 1.5°C, compared to 2°C, could go hand in hand with ensuring a more sustainable and equitable society.

“One of the key messages that come out very strongly from this report is that we are already seeing the consequences of 1°C of global warming through more extreme weather, rising sea levels and diminishing Arctic sea ice, among other changes,” said Panmao Zhai, co-chair of IPCC Working Group I.

In an address to delegates at CWA, secretary-general of CARICOM, Irwin LaRocque said the IPCC report supports the findings of Caribbean climate scientists “which showed that we will attain the 1.5°C warmer world much sooner than anticipated — by 2030”.

LaRocque said such as situation will result in much harsher climatic conditions for the Caribbean.

“Worse, the current trend of Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) for reductions in greenhouse gas emissions, would lead to warming in the range of three degrees centigrade by the end of the century.”

CARICOM continues to advocate for greater ambition in the reduction of greenhouse gases, but must prepare for the worst, he said.

“We, therefore, need to upscale our planning for adapting to that reality,” LaRocque said, even as he noted that the IPCC report corroborates Caribbean scientists’ projections that even a 1.5 degree rise would result in significant impacts on fresh water and agricultural yields.

Further, such a level of warming would cause extreme temperatures, increases in frequency, intensity, and/or amount of heavy precipitation, and an increase in intensity or frequency of droughts.

“To counter that threat, we have been working on a programme along with our international development partners, to improve the resilience of the agriculture sector,” he said.

LaRocque pointed out that CARICOM’s agricultural research agency has been developing climate smart agriculture technologies suitable for agriculture in the region.

“CARDI has recommended identification, storage, sharing and utilisation of climate-ready germplasm of important food crops as one of the best mechanisms for building climate resilience that safeguards food and nutrition security.”

Meanwhile, CARICOM’s newest head of government, prime minister of Barbados, Mia Mottley, reminded delegates at the event that in September she told the United Nations General Assembly that the CARICOM region understands that it has been made dispensable “by those who believe that a 2-degree change in temperature is acceptable to the world”.

She told CWA that she did not know then that the IPCC report that came after her speech would paint such a scenario.

Mottley, who was elected to office in May, said, however, that Caribbean nationals should not have been taken by surprise.

“For us, our own scientists warned us of the ravages with respect to drought, with respect to the destruction of our reefs, and by extension, our marine life.

“They warned us, more than 10 years ago. And we have allowed others to determine our advocacy and our voice without, perhaps remembering that phrase from one of the other countries, Jamaica, that ‘We small but we tallawah (feisty)’.”

And while those calls were not headed a decade ago, Hurricane Maria and the other cyclones, including Hurricane Irma, which affected the Caribbean in 2017, have brought them home forcefully.

“One of the things we have learnt is resilience, resilience, resilience…

“Dominica is a mountainous country. We farm on the hillsides. But there are technologies that can now be used to protect your lands from moving. We have to begin using new and innovative technologies,” Austrie told IPS as he reflected on the impact of Hurricane Maria on Dominica.

“And so we believe that while Maria dealt us a blow and nobody wishes for another Maria, it taught us some lessons, which had it was not for Maria, we would have taken for granted. We had adopted a kind of complacent attitude but I believe that Maria really struck us and sent it home that we have to begin to do things differently,” Austrie said.

Second- and third-place winners, respectively, in the Caricom Energy Month Photography and Art competition, Candice Sobers and Seon Thompson, holding the works that won them the prizes. Credit: Jewel Fraser/IPS

By Jewel Fraser
PORT OF SPAIN, Trinidad, Aug 30 2017 (IPS)

Conversations about renewable and sustainable energy don’t typically include artistic ideas on the subject. However, the Caribbean Community (Caricom) has chosen to engage the region’s youth in the conversation by inviting them to create artistic works on sustainable energy for a regional competition.

Seven of the nine winners in the 2016 competition were from Trinidad and Tobago and in June they were honoured at a ceremony held by Trinidad and Tobago’s Ministry of Energy and Energy Industries.Sobers said her focus in painting “Mother Energy” was to encourage “sustaining the environment with the right motive, with a motive of loving it, cherishing it and benefiting from it."

Some of those winners told IPS that the competition had indeed kindled their desire to be a part of the sustainable/renewable energy discussion now taking place in the region.

Candice Sobers, who won second place in the professional art category, describes entering art competitions “as a hobby” because “exposure in the arts is difficult to come by in Trinidad”. Nevertheless, the research she did for the competition has had an impact on how she uses energy. She now turns off any lights and appliances in her home that are not in use, and she has invested in energy-saving light bulbs.

Sobers’ entry to the Caricom Energy Month art and photography competition depicted a tree painted in the shape of woman who is seen pregnant with the sun. The mother tree’s mode of transportation is a bicycle and the environment she inhabits comprises various forms of renewable energy.

The painting, entitled “Mother Energy”, is rendered in acrylics, coloured pencil, and oil pastels. Sobers describes her work, in part, as follows: “The bicycle is a means of exercise without burning fossil fuels, encouraging the reduction of the carbon footprint. The energy saving bulb hangs on her neck as an accessory while she rides by the hydro-electric plant and wind mill landscape.”

Sobers said her focus in painting “Mother Energy” was to encourage “sustaining the environment with the right motive, with a motive of loving it, cherishing it and benefiting from it. If the motive is only for money mankind will find themselves abusing it in some form.”

Winners in the Caricom Energy Month art competition Fidelis Iwueke (from left), Candice Sobers, and Seon Thompson. Credit: Jewel Fraser/IPS

Third-placed winner in the professional art category, Seon Thompson, likewise chose to use a woman as part of his iconography. Like Sobers, Thompson holds a BA in Visual Arts from the University of the West Indies, St. Augustine. He told IPS, “I tried to give a double meaning to some of the elements.”

He explained that the hair of the woman, in a traditional corn row hairstyle, was also used to depict rows of plants while the palm trees seen in the landscape behind her also carried the implication of wind turbines. As one gazes at the painting, one’s eyes are led by the graceful lines of the woman’s arm and the undulating lines of cool blue and green depicting her hair to the warm, vividly coloured sun and mountains she carries in a basket on her head, with their obvious allusion to solar energy.

In explaining his work, Thompson said. “I really wanted to connect sustainable energy with the elements of the Caribbean we all could relate to—sun, foliage, fauna, people, houses and hills.” The houses in his painting are shown with solar panels on their roofs.

“In the Caribbean, we have two seasons, rainy and dry, so we really should be using solar energy, hydro energy, and so on….We are a prime example of nations that have all the elements aligned to practise sustaintable energy. We just need to invest in it more and see the value of utilising these mediums that exist and are readily available.”

Thompson said in creating his painting, “I really wanted to create an experience, not just have people say ‘that’s nice’. You must have an experience and really leave with something on your mind.”

He said he has started a project at the school where he teaches art to promote the idea of sustainability. The project encourages Form 5 students to find objects that are discarded and repurpose them in ways that are beneficial and profitable.

For 19-year-old Fidelis Iwueke, the first prize winner in the Caricom Energy Month video competition, his studies at A’Level in Environmental Science provided the foundation for his creation.

He provided IPS with a textbook definition of sustainability. “Sustainability is to ensure that the needs of today are provided for without compromising the future.”

Iwueke has just finished secondary school and his success in the video competition has awakened an interest in documentary production as a prospective career. “I am a former documentary junkie. I love documentaries,” he said. He is also a poet and spoken word artist, which made the video competition the most suitable category for him, he said.

Using public domain footage and videos that he gained permission to use, Iwueke was able to create his award-winning video. He began by creating an audio track of his voice discussing the topic of sustainable energy, to which he added music. He then overlaid this on the video he had obtained, following which he edited the video using the WeVideo app on his phone. The result was a seamless production that belies the fact that this was his first foray into video production.

The video opens with delightful clips showing the sea and other scenes from nature in the Caribbean, then segues to West Indians in the midst of carnival, as his voiceover ties the clips together by referring to the Caribbean’s sea and sun and then to Caribbean people as “a people full of energy…and we rely on energy for growth, survival and sustainable development. For sustainable development, we need sustainable energy.”

The video then goes on to discuss why sustainable energy is important and the different forms that are available to Caribbean people and encourages their use, while holding viewers’ attention with arresting footage.

Reflecting on the competition theme, Iwueke said, “The sun is always there. We have nice oceans for tidal energy. We just need a basic attitude change; changes in our consumption patterns could go a long way.”

Despite learning environmental science at school, preparing for the competition was a learning experience for him. “I liked and followed the Caricom Energy page to keep in the know. I learned how far the Caribbean has come and how much more we need to do,” he said.

The competition thus provided an avenue for these young Caribbean artists to further their practice, while making them more invested in sustainable energy as a lifestyle. “Now that I am more aware of renewable energy, I will become more of an advocate in any way possible. And when the finances are there I will make better choices,” said Iwueke.

Oraine Halstead (left) and Rhys Actie tend tomatoes in a greenhouse at Colesome Farm at Jonas Road, Antigua. Credit: Desmond Brown/IPS

By Jewel Fraser
PORT OF SPAIN, Trinidad, Feb 7 2017 (IPS)

As Caricom countries struggle to move away from their traditional reliance on a single industry or major crop in the face of growing economic uncertainty worldwide, they are finding it increasingly difficult to enter markets in the EU and North America with new types of food products.

But tariffs are no longer the main barriers to accessing important markets, according to a document produced by the ACP-EU Overcoming Technical Barriers to Trade (TBT) programme.Latin America and the Caribbean provide over 90 per cent of the fruits and nearly 80 per cent of all vegetables imported by the US. Nonetheless, some countries in the region have “very high rejection rates” at US ports of entry.

The ACP-EU is of the view that “Non-tariffs barriers will become the main challenge of the future multilateral trade system.” Specifically, technical barriers related to compliance with sanitary and phytosanitary standards (SPS) in export markets and other standards including those relating to labelling and packaging.

The EU considers these technical, non-tariff, barriers to trade so challenging for its African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) partners that it provided 15 million euros starting in 2013 to help those developing countries upgrade their processes and become compliant, thus giving them a better chance of success on the EU and North America markets.

The Caribbean Agribusiness Association (CABA) is one Caribbean organisation that was able to access funding to help its members move toward HACCP (Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Point) certification, which the ACP-EU TBT programme identified as a crucial requirement. Since the early 2000s, the US and EU have stipulated that foods entering their markets must have HACCP certification.

Ten of CABA’s members were present at a regional conference, held at the Radisson Hotel in Port-of-Spain Jan. 29-30, to report on the benefits they received from the HACCP training. They heard some sobering statistics with regard to the EU and US food industry that provided context for the TBT programme.

Dr. Andre Gordon, chief executive officer of TSL Technical Services Limited, told delegates that each year, the UK records approximately one million cases of food-borne illnesses, of which about 20,000 require hospitalisation, and 500 deaths are recorded. The cost to the UK of dealing with food-borne illnesses is 1.4 billion pounds annually.

In the US, approximately 48 million cases of food-borne illnesses are recorded annually, resulting in 128,000 hospitalisations and 3,000 deaths. The cost to the US of dealing with food-borne illnesses is approximately 77.7 billion dollars annually, the delegates heard.

The 2016 report, “Addressing Food Losses due to Non-Compliance with Quality and Safety Requirements in Export Markets: the case of Fruits and Vegetables from the Latin America and the Caribbean Region,” by two Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) experts, underlined how much is at stake for Caribbean agribusiness exporters.

The report reveals that Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) provide over 90 per cent of the fruits and nearly 80 per cent of all vegetables imported by the US. Nonetheless, some countries in the region have “very high rejection rates” at US ports of entry, including Jamaica, Bolivia and the Dominican Republic, the document states.

The report said, “While many LAC countries have a good rate of acceptance in comparison with other countries exporting to the USA and EU, a few countries within LAC perform very poorly, revealing great disparity in preparedness for export trading within the region.” The report noted that “Multiple handling failures along the chain are likely the cause of the most frustrating complaints by international buyers.”

Dr. Gordon, who oversaw the Jamaica ackee industry’s transformation that made it compliant with US Food and Drug Administration regulations in the early 2000s so that it could gain access to the US market, explained to IPS the obstacles facing Caribbean exporters.

“The problem in general with all agribusiness companies in the Caribbean is typically lack of technical capacity and knowledge of the requirements and lack of the resources to implement the systems as required,” he said.

However, Dr. Gordon said, “The cultural change that is required is probably the biggest single limitation to implementing and sustaining certification systems…If the management and ownership [of agribusinesses] do not have a vision of becoming global players then the effort and resources required are going to seem unattainable and not good value for money. A lot of firms have issues with understanding the value for money proposition of embarking on a certification programme.”

The briefing paper “SPS measures lead to high costs and losses for developing countries”, published not long after the EU mandated HACCP certification for all exporters to the EU, noted that “As the income level of developing countries is far smaller, …the opportunity cost of compliance is relatively far higher than that for developed country exporters.

“The rapid change in SPS measures, regulations and notifications of new regulations is another problem facing developing countries in preparing for compliance. It also imposes extra costs on investors and exporters and creates uncertainty for them.”

However, the paper’s author concluded, “while the cost of compliance is high, the cost of lack of compliance is even higher” because of loss of market share or reduced access to markets.

Dr. Gordon revealed that in 2010, the Caribbean had the second highest level of food rejections of any region at US ports of entry.

A March 2016 FAO report highlighted other issues hindering Caribbean agribusinesses in their efforts to export. The report states: “A number of deep-seated challenges inhibit Caribbean agriculture diversification and competitiveness: the small and fragmented nature of most farm units; the absence of strong farmer grass-roots organizations; the cost of agricultural labor; the ageing demographics of Caribbean farmers; an education system that does not prepare youth to seek employment opportunities in the agricultural sector; and extension systems that have historically focused on managing the traditional export crops.”

The problem of small farm units is being addressed head on, said CABA’s president Vassel Stewart, with the formation of CABEXCO, a new umbrella organisation for SMEs in the Caricom agribusiness sector, which will jointly procure raw materials and services as well as market its members’ products and reach out to new buyers.

The resulting economies of scale will also hopefully make it easier to bear the cost of becoming compliant with US and EU food export regulations.

Dominican journalist Amelia Deschamps addressing a workshop in Santo Domingo on the role of reporters with regard to climate change. Researchers and journalists from Cuba, Haiti and the Dominican Republic took part in the event. Credit: Dionny Matos/IPS

By Ivet González
SANTO DOMINGO, Jan 6 2016 (IPS)

Environmentally committed journalists in the Caribbean point to a major challenge for media workers: communicating and raising awareness about the crucial climate change agreement that emerged from the 21st Conference of the Parties (COP21) in Paris.

“Scientific information must be published in clearer language, and we must talk about the real impact of climate change on people’s lives,” journalist Amelia Deschamps, an anchorwoman on the El Día newcast of the Dominican channel Telesistema 11, told IPS.

She was referring to the communication challenges posed in the wake of COP21 to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, held Nov. 30 to Dec. 11 in Paris to produce the first universal agreement to cut greenhouse gas emissions and curb the negative impacts of global warming.

“So far good intentions abound, but there are few practical steps being taken in terms of mitigation and adaptation,” said Deschamps.

In the view of this journalist who specialises in environmental affairs, media coverage of global warming “has been very weak and oversimplified,” which she said has contributed to the public sense that it is a “merely scientific” issue that has little connection to people’s lives.

“People are more concerned about things that directly affect them,” said Deschamps, who is also an activist for risk management in poor communities, and considers citizen mobilisation key to curbing damage to the environment.

The 195 country parties to the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change meeting in the French capital adopted a binding universal agreement aimed at keeping a global temperature rise this century “well below 2 degrees Celsius” with respect to the pre-industrial era.

Scientists warn that the planet is heating up as a result of human activity, and this is causing extreme weather events such as heat waves, lengthy droughts and heavy rainfall. In addition, clean water, fertile land and biodiversity are all being reduced.

Coastal areas are already suffering the consequences of rising sea levels, a process that according to scientific sources began 20,000 years ago, but has been accelerated by global warming over the last 150 years.

Small island nations such as those of the Caribbean are among the most vulnerable to climate change, while their emissions have contributed very little to the phenomenon.

“As journalists and communicators we have not managed to identify the right messages to make the public feel involved in this issue,” said Deschamps at a workshop organised by the Cuban Environmental Protection Agency, the Dominican Chapter of the Nicolás Guillén Foundation, the Norwegian Embassy and the Inter Press Service (IPS) international news agency.

Marie Jeanne Moisse, a reporter and environmental educator who works in the climate change office in Haiti’s Environment Ministry, spoke during a workshop in Santo Domingo about the media’s role in reporting on and raising awareness about global warming. Credit: Dionny Matos/IPS

To train reporters from the Caribbean, a group of experts from Cuba, Mexico and the Dominican Republic offered a Nov. 23-26 course on “Social Communication for Risk Prevention, Gender and Climate Change” in the Dominican capital.

The course was attended by 41 journalists from Haiti and the Dominican Republic. It included three talks that experts gave to students from two rural schools and to a group of 25 Haitian-Dominican women.

“The media need to be trained to provide more information at a national level on the phenomenon and about the agreement reached at COP21,” said Marie Jeanne Moise, an official in the climate change office in Haiti’s Environment Ministry.

According to Moise, a communicator and educator on the environment, “there is alarming talk today about global warming, and people are scared. But that doesn’t mean they know about the phenomenon or about how to protect themselves, to reduce the impacts on their lives.”

Moise urged journalists and reporters to “go to the roots of the problem.”

“News coverage focuses on catastrophes and on how vulnerable we are. But little is said about what contribution the media should make to help bring about a positive change in attitude towards the environment.”

The Haitian official said COP21 “created greater unity among the Caribbean as a vulnerable region that needs to adopt a common position.”

The countries in the region that took part in COP21 are negotiating as part of the Caribbean Community (CARICOM), made up of 15 mainly island nations, and as part of the Alliance of Small Island States (AOSIS).

Ahead of COP21, CARICOM launched the “1.5 to Stay Alive” campaign to raise awareness on the effects of climate change, especially on small island states, while strengthening the region’s negotiating position.

CARICOM estimates that inaction could cost its member countries 10.7 billion dollars in losses by 2025, or five percent of GDP, and some 22 billion dollars by 2050, or 10 percent of GDP.

Haiti and the Dominican Republic, which share the island of Hispaniola, are on the list of the 10 countries most vulnerable to natural disasters, according to the Climate Change and Environmental Risk Analytics report published in 2012 by Verisk Maplecroft, a global risk analytics and forecasting company based in Britain.

Besides physical and economic exposure to events like earthquakes and hurricanes, these countries are vulnerable due to social inequality, a lack of preparedness, and unequal distribution of local and regional capacities, said the study, which compared 197 countries using 29 indices and interactive maps analysing major natural hazards worldwide.

Dominican blogger and human rights activist Yesibon Reynoso said that in his country “quite a lot is known and talked about, with regard to the environment, because of the current circumstances.”

But, he said, “for example, deforestation is not always punished. Impunity reigns through exploitation with the support of corruption in the state.”

In his view, “environmental rights are not addressed in accordance with how essential they are to life, in the country and around the globe. There is no traditional social and political respect for the environment.”

Edited by Estrella Gutiérrez/Translated by Stephanie Wildes

By Desmond Brown
GEORGETOWN, Guyana, Dec 31 2015 (IPS)

Climate change is already affecting the Caribbean. But there is concern that a gap still exists between what the region’s leaders are saying about the issue and what residents believe.

This, along with the issue of funding to address the financial flows needed for adaptation and mitigation are among priority areas for the Caribbean post COP21.

Ambassador Irwin LaRocque, the Secretary General of CARICOM, a political and economic union comprising 15 small, developing, climate-vulnerable islands and low-lying nations, said there ought to be transparency in terms of the commitments countries make.

French President François Hollande and President of the Regional Council of Martinique, Serge Letchimy. Credit: Desmond Brown/IPS

By Desmond Brown
FORT-DE-FRANCE, Martinique, May 9 2015 (IPS)

Caribbean leaders on Saturday further advanced their policy position on climate change ahead of the 21^st Conference of Parties, also known as COP 21, scheduled for Paris during November and December of this year.

The position of the Caribbean Community (CARICOM), 14 independent countries, was put forward by the group’s chairman, Bahamas Prime Minister Perry Christie, during a meeting here with French President François Hollande.“For the Bahamas, which has 80 percent of its land mass within one metre of mean sea level, climate change is an existential threat." -- Bahamas Prime Minister Perry Christie

“The evidence of the impact of climate change within our region is very evident. Grenada saw a 300 percent loss of GDP (Gross Domestic Product) as a result of one storm,” Christie told IPS

“We see across CARICOM, an average of two to five percent loss of growth due to hurricanes and tropical process which occur annually.

“For the Bahamas, which has 80 percent of its land mass within one metre of mean sea level, climate change is an existential threat to our land mass. Indeed, that is the story across the region. And as I have said from place to place, if the sea level rises some five feet in the Bahamas, 80 percent of the Bahamas as we know it will disappear. The stark reality of that means, we are here to talk about survival,” Christie added.

The Caribbean Community comprises the Bahamas, Belize, Barbados, Guyana, Haiti, Jamaica, Suriname, Trinidad and Tobago and the member states of the Eastern Caribbean Currency Union – Antigua and Barbuda, Dominica, Grenada, St Kitts-Nevis, St Lucia and St Vincent and the Grenadines.

Saturday’s summit gathered more than 40 heads of state, governments and Caribbean organisations to discuss the impact of climate change on the nations of the region.

The president of the Regional Council of Martinique, Serge Letchimy, said the summit goal is to give a voice to Caribbean nations on climate change through a joint statement, to be called “The Martinique Appeal”, to be heard at COP 21.

“Caribbean Climate 2015 is a push,” said Letchimy, “to vigorously encourage the international community to reach an agreement at COP21 to keep global warming below 2 degrees C. This is a crucial goal for Caribbean island nations that are particularly vulnerable to climate change and which only contribute 0.3 percent of global greenhouse emissions.”

Letchimy said Martinique is addressing the climate issue by aggressively implementing the Climate, Air and Energy Master Plan developed in cooperation with the French government.

In order to promote a more circular economy that consumes less non-renewable resources, the Regional Council of Martinique has also decided to go beyond the Master Plan with a programme called “Martinique – Sustainable Island.” The goal is to achieve a 100 percent renewable energy mix by 2030.

Dominica’s Prime Minister Roosevelt Skerrit said climate change is having a huge impact on the environment of his country, which in turn impacts on agriculture and the country’s eco-system.

“As you know we promote heavily ecotourism, and if action is not taken by the international community to halt greenhouse gas emissions we’re going to have a serious challenge,” Skerrit told IPS.

“We’re a coastal country and as the years go by you are seeing an erosion of the coastal landscape. You have a lot of degradation taking place. That has resulted in us spending tremendous sums of money to mitigate against that.

“Clearly, small countries like Dominica, and indeed the entire OECS do not have the kind of resources required to mitigate against climate change. We are the least contributors but we are the most affected,” Skerrit explained.

He said that out of this summit, Caribbean countries are hoping for a partnership with France to drum up support for the concerns of small island states like those in the OECS.

For the director general of the OECS, Dr. Didicus Jules, the impacts of climate change can be seen everywhere across the region, ranging from the rapid onslaught events like floods in St. Lucia, to the severity of hurricanes and erosion of beaches.

“It’s beginning to pose a huge threat as we saw in the case of St. Vincent and the Grenadines. The last event there, the damage was equivalent of about more than 20 percent of their GDP,” he told IPS.

“So just a simple event can set us back so drastically and that is why the member states are so concerned because these events have all kinds of downstream impacts on the economy, not just the damage and loss caused by the events themselves.”

OECS Director General Dr. Didicus Jules. Credit: Desmond Brown/IPS

The trough on Dec. 24, 2013 brought torrential rains, death and destruction not only to St. Vincent and the Grenadines but to St. Lucia and Dominica as well.

In the last three years, St. Vincent and the Grenadines has been forced to spend more than 600 million dollars to rebuild its battered infrastructure. Landslides in April 2011, followed by the December 2013 floods left 13 people dead.

Jules said today’s meeting is unprecedented because France will be the chair of the COP meeting in Paris and it is perhaps the largest international event that the French president himself will personally chair.

COP21 will seek a new international agreement on the climate with the aim of keeping global warming below 2 degrees C. France and the European Union will play key roles in securing a consensus by the United Nations in these critical climate negotiations.

“He (President Hollande) wants this to be a success and use the opportunity to champion the voices of small island states given the French Republic’s presence in the OECS we felt that it was really a useful forum for having the voice of the Caribbean in this wider sense heard,” Jules said.

“That’s one of the reasons that we are now pressing hard with the French authorities to champion the cause of small island states so that the larger countries, those who are the biggest causes of the impacts on the environment take heed to what the scientists are saying.”

The CARICOM chairman said a satisfactory and binding agreement in Paris must include five essential elements.

These are, clarity on ambitious targets for developed countries, including a long-term goal for significant emission reductions; clarity on the adaptation measures and resources required to facilitate and enhance the sustainable development plans and programmes in small developing countries and thereby significantly reduce the level of poverty in these countries; and clarity on measures and mechanisms to address the development challenges associated with climate change, sea level rise and loss and damage for small island and low-lying coastal developing states.

Christie said it must also include clarity on how the financial and technological support both for mitigation and adaptation will be generated and disbursed to small developing countries.

“Further, it must be recognised that the existing widespread practice of using Gross Domestic Product per capita as the primary basis for access to resources simply does not address the reality of the vulnerability of our countries,” he said.

Edited by Kitty Stapp

A woman purchases fish at a market in Kingstown, St. Vincent. CARICOM leaders say fisheries is one of the important economic sectors already being impacted by climate change. Credit: Kenton X. Chance/IPS

By Kenton X. Chance
CASTRIES, St. Lucia, Apr 28 2015 (IPS)

When the international climate change talks ended in Peru last December, the 15-member Caribbean Community (CARICOM), a political and economic union comprising small, developing, climate-vulnerable islands and low-lying nations, left with “the bare minimum necessary to continue the process to address climate change”.

“The Lima Accord did decide that the Parties would continue to work on the elements in the Annex to develop a negotiating text for the new Climate Change Agreement. We wanted a stronger statement that these were the elements to be used to draft the negotiating text,” Carlos Fuller, international and regional liaison officer at the Caribbean Community Climate Change Centre told IPS."We are looking to develop a position that will allow our heads [of state] to speak with one unified position on climate change." -- Minister James Fletcher

“We did not get the specific mention that Loss and Damage would be included in the new agreement, but there is also no mention that it would not be included. On Intended Nationally Determined Contributions (INDCs), we got an agreement that all parties would submit their contributions for the new agreement during 2015.

“However, we lost all the specifics that would inform parties on what should be submitted. We lost the review process for the INDCs and only those parties who wished to respond to questions for clarification would do so,” Fuller said.

The Lima talks forms part of the homestretch leg of negotiations ahead of the 21st Conference of Parties (COP21) of the 196 Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), slated for Paris in December.

The UNFCCC is the parent treaty of the 1997 Kyoto Protocol, which has been ratified by 192 of the UNFCCC Parties. The ultimate objective of both treaties is to stabilise greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere at a level that will prevent dangerous human interference with the climate system.

At the meeting in Paris, parties are expected to sign a legally binding accord intended to keep human-induced global temperature rise within levels that science says will avert catastrophic climate change.

CARICOM negotiators are trying to avoid a repeat of Lima and are identifying the “red line” issues that are “sacrosanct” for their populations as they prepare for the Paris summit.

In preparation for the Paris talks, lead negotiators from CARICOM met here on Apr. 21, first, to prepare for an engagement of CARICOM heads with French President François Hollande in Martinique on May 9.

“President Hollande, I guess, is intending to meet with CARICOM heads to get from them what are the main concerns of Caribbean small island developing states and to see how he can develop some momentum, some consensus leading to Paris,” James Fletcher, St. Lucia’s Minister for the Public Service, Sustainable Development, Energy Science and Technology, tells IPS.

The Castries meeting brought together CARICOM lead negotiators and technical experts on climate change, Fletcher says, adding, “Our meeting was a meeting of technical experts to really refine what are our main positions, what are the issues that are sacrosanct for us, what are the red line issues, that, as far as we are concerned, any new agreement on climate change must address.”

Serge Letchimy, president of the Regional Council of Martinique, tells IPS that the regional summit in Martinique “is dedicated to preparation and mobilisation toward” COP 21 and will bring together states and territories of the Caribbean.

The regional summit aims to list the initiatives of the Caribbean region “which must be integrated in a ‘schedule of solutions’ adapted to the specificities of these territories,” explains Maïté Cabrera, a media relations official involved in the organisation of the Martinique meeting.

“It also aims to contribute to the writing of an ambitious and binding global agreement which must be adopted during COP21,” Cabrera tells IPS.

St. Lucia’s Minister for the Public Service, Sustainable Development, Energy Science and Technology, James Fletcher, says a climate change deal favourable to the Caribbean will help to protect the important tourism sector. Credit: Kenton X. Chance/IPS

The Castries meeting of CARICOM climate change negotiators was also a stocktaking gathering at which officials examined the status of their proposals ahead of COP 21.

“Our negotiators have been involved in negotiations; the first round of negotiations was in Geneva this year. There are still negotiations to take place on a range of issues — adaptation, climate finance, loss and damage, Intended Nationally Determined Contributions and a range of issues,” Fletcher tells IPS.

“This really allows us to take stock of how the negotiations are going and what are the main issues and where we should be identifying with the negotiations,” he says.

A third element of the Castries gathering had to do with preparing for a meeting of U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon and CARICOM leaders at the CARICOM Head of Government meeting in Barbados in July.

“So, again, we are looking to develop a position that will allow our heads to speak with one position, one unified position on climate change in that meeting with the Secretary General, which, again, deals with climate change and climate finance.”

Fletcher is optimistic that the Caribbean will make progress on its positions on climate change ahead of and ultimately at COP 21, saying that the region has been “very united in its position on climate change”.

“If there is one thing I can say from the time I have been involved in this process is that Caribbean heads, Caribbean countries have all been united on our issues, there is no disagreement amount us,” says Fletcher, who has attended several COPs, including in Warsaw in 2013 and Lima in 2014.

However, he also identified areas in which the region can do more to shore up its negotiating ahead of Paris.

“I think what needs to happen a little more is coordination and this is what today’s meeting is about, ensuring that that coordination is there,” he tells IPS, adding that coordination worked well at the Third International Conference on Small Island Developing States (SIDS) in Samoa last year.

Fletcher tells IPS that at the Samoa conference “there was a very strong Caribbean presence and a very good coordinated presence to ensure that we were able to speak with the same voice and we attended all the meeting in numbers and that is what we are aiming for in Paris this year”.

He pointed out that the outcome of the Paris summit will have a direct impact on the residents of the Caribbean.

“We have been saying for a long time now that climate change represents an existential threat for small island developing states like the Caribbean, that we have to limit global warming to no more than 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels, and that anything above 1.5 degrees Celsius will cause catastrophic sea level rise, will cause warming of our oceans, will cause acidification of our oceans, which will impact our fisheries, impact our tourism sector, will cause reduction in water availability and that has impacts for agriculture, for ordinary lives, for availability and accessibility of potable water,” he tells IPS.

“Anything above 1.5 degrees will result in an increase in the severity and frequency of extreme weather events like storms and hurricanes. So, we have a very real stake in what comes out of Paris, and we cannot allow the Paris agreement to be one that we know will cause us to have a climate that is warming at a rate that is catastrophic for us, small island countries like ours, and low-lying countries like Guyana,” Fletcher tells IPS.

Edited by Kitty Stapp

By Joaquín Roy
MIAMI, Apr 14 2015 (IPS)

U.S. President Barack Obama has earned a place in history for taking the first steps towards rectifying a policy that has lasted over half a century without ever achieving its primary goal of ending the Castro regime in Cuba.

At the Seventh Summit of the Americas, held in Panama City Apr. 10-11, Obama set aside the tortuous negotiations with his Cuban counterpart Raúl Castro and the impossible pursuit of consensus with his domestic opponents. Going out on a limb, he made an unconditional offer. He knew, or he sensed, that Castro would have no option but to accept.

Joaquín Roy

The Cuban economy is on the verge of collapse and the regime is receiving subtle pressure from a population that has already endured all manner of trials.

Signs of weakening in Venezuela, its protector, with which it exchanged social favours (in the fields of health and education) for subsidised oil, are gathering like hurricane storm clouds over the Raúl Castro regime

Instead of shaking the tree to knock the ripe fruit to the ground, Obama chose to do the unexpected: to prop it up and instead encourage its survival.

Obama is committing to stability in Cuba as the lesser evil, compared with sparking an internal explosion, with conflict between irreconcilable sectors and the imposition of a military solution more rigid than the current level of control. Washington knows that only the Cuban armed forces can guarantee order. The last thing the Pentagon aspires to is to take on that unenviable role.

Thus, between underpinning the Raúl Castro government and the doubtful prospect of attempting instantaneous transformation, the pragmatic option was to renew full diplomatic relations and, in the near future, lift the embargo.

Raúl Castro, for his part, yielded ground on the oft-repeated demand for an end to the embargo as a prior condition for any negotiations, and has responded wisely to the challenge. He contented himself with the consolation prize of reviewing the history (incidentally, an appalling one) of U.S. policy towards Cuba, in his nearly one-hour speech at the Summit.

“Obama is committing to stability in Cuba as the lesser evil, compared with sparking an internal explosion, with conflict between irreconcilable sectors and the imposition of a military solution more rigid than the current level of control”
To sugar the pill, however, he generously recognised that Obama, who was not even born at the time of the Cuban Revolution, shares no blame for the blockade. In this way, Castro contributed decisively to Obama’s triumph at the summit.

Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro has emerged from this inter-American gathering as the clear loser. The key to his failure was not having calculated his limitations and having undervalued the resources of his fellow presidents. Initially, Maduro logically exploited Obama’s mistake in decreeing that Venezuela is a “threat” and imposing sanctions on seven Venezuelan officials.

A large number of governments and analysts criticised the language used in the U.S. decree. In the run-up to the summit, Obama publicly recanted and admitted that Venezuela is no such threat to his country.

Maduro’s weak showing at the Summit was due to a combination of his own personality, the reactions of important external actors (significantly distant from the United States), the weak support of many of his traditional allies or sympathisers in Latin America, and the absence of unconditional support from Cuba.

It should be noted that the United States barely made its presence felt over this issue, although U.S. State Department counsellor Thomas Shannon made an effort to smooth over Maduro’s excesses and visited the Venezuelan president in Caracas ahead of the summit.

Maduro’s actions were already burdened by the imprisonment of a number of his opponents on questionable charges. As a result, protests spread worldwide, especially in Latin America, but also in Europe.

A score of former Latin American presidents signed a protest document which was presented at the summit.

Although these former presidents might be regarded as conservative and liberal, they were joined by former Spanish president José María Aznar (a notorious target of attacks by the late Venezuelan president Hugo Chávez and, afterwards, Maduro himself) and former Spanish socialist president Felipe González, who offered to act as defence lawyer for Antonio Ledezma, the mayor of Caracas, who is one of those imprisoned by the Venezuelan regime.

Maduro’s attempt to have a condemnation of the U.S. decree included in the summit’s final communiqué ended in another defeat. Although efforts were made to eliminate direct mention of the United States, the outcome was that the summit issued no final declaration because of lack of consensus.

In spite of the loquacity of its partners and protégés in the Bolivarian Alliance for the Peoples of Our America (ALBA), Venezuela’s Latin American supporters showed caution and avoided direct confrontation with Washington.

The same was evidently true of the Caribbean countries; fearful of losing supplies of subsidised Venezuelan oil, they made their request to Obama for preferential treatment by the United States at the meeting of the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) in Jamaica earlier in the month.

But Maduro’s main failure was not realising that Raúl Castro would have to choose between fear of diminished supplies of cheap Venezuelan crude and rapprochement with Washington. It remains unknown how Cuba will be able to continue supplying Cuban teachers and healthcare personnel to Venezuela, until now the jewel in the crown of the alliance between Havana and Caracas in the context of ALBA.

Translated by Valerie Dee/Edited by Phil Harris   

The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of, and should not be attributed to, IPS – Inter Press Service. 

Joaquín Roy can be contacted at jroy@Miami.edu

Excerpt:

Vendors at the fish market in Belize. Courtesy of the Fisheries Department Belize City, Belize.

By Zadie Neufville
KINGSTON, Mar 17 2015 (IPS)

Caribbean nations have begun work on a plan to ‘climate smart’ the region’s fisheries as part of overall efforts to secure food supplies.

The concept is in keeping with plans by the Technical Centre for Agricultural and Rural Cooperation (CTA) to improve the “integration of agriculture and climate readiness” as the region prepares to deal with the impacts of climate change and the increasing demand for food.“With the projections, we're looking at almost total loss of our corals. For us in the Caribbean our reefs are important, not from the perspective of tourism, but from the perspective of livelihoods when you consider fisheries." -- Dr. Orville Grey

Olu Ajayi, CTA’s senior programme coordinator, told IPS in an email that climate-smarting the region’s aquatic resources will “enable the sector to continue to contribute to sustainable development, while reducing the vulnerability associated with the negative impacts of climate change”.

“Climate-smart fisheries require improving efficiency in the use of natural resources to produce fish, maintaining the resilience of aquatic systems and the communities that rely on them,” he noted.

The fisheries sector of the Caribbean Community is an important source of livelihoods and sustenance for the estimated 182,000 people who directly depend on these resources. In recent years, fishermen across the region have reported fewer and smaller fish in their nets and scientists believe these are signs of the times, not just the result of over-exploitation and habitat degradation.

“We believe the signs of climate change are already affecting our vital fisheries sector in the increase in seaweed events causing the loss of access to fishing grounds and increased frequency of coral bleaching events,” Peter A. Murray, Caribbean Regional Fisheries Mechanism (CRFM) Secretariat’s Programme Manager, Fisheries Management and Development, told IPS.

Listing some of the predicted changes, including climatic variations that promote the spread of invasive species, as well as increased salination, Murray noted that climate change is also expected to impact traditional species and contribute to coastal erosion due to more frequent and devastating hurricanes.

In fact, the secretariat’s Deputy Executive Director Susan Singh Renton told reporters at the Caribbean Week of Agriculture last November that warmer seas could also push larger species to the north, making them less available to regional fishers. CRFM is the Caricom organisation charged with the promotion of responsible use of regional fisheries.

Two weeks after launching its Climate Smart Agriculture project at the 13th celebration of Caribbean Week of Agriculture in Paramaribo, Suriname in November 2014, the CTA began development of several initiatives. The programmes, they said would help the region to “tackle the impact of agriculture on small-scale producers” – among them small-scale fishers and fish farmers – in a way that will facilitate the construction of “resilient agricultural systems”.

The project came on the heels of the announcement of a Caribbean Community Common Fisheries Policy (CCCFP) and the CRFM Climate Change Action Plan. These are two of several proposals by Community organisations to monitor and regulate capture fisheries as well as implement common goals and rules on the adaptation, management, and conservation of the resources.

Ajayi pointed out that since 2010, the CTA has been working closely with regional agencies including the Caribbean Community Climate Change Centre (5Cs) and the CRFM to implement the Regional Framework for Achieving Development Resilience to Climate Change.

Timely, since some of the species most fished and traded by the region’s fishermen are already under pressure from over-exploitation, degraded habitats and pollution. The Queen Conch, the Caribbean Spiny Lobster, the Nassau Grouper and the Parrotfish are among a growing list of species under closer scrutiny for tougher regulations on their capture and trade. Climate change is expected to make the problems worse.

“The support is aimed at developing common regional policy platforms and advocating regional policy initiatives in regional and global forums; strengthening national capacities through training and other supports and conducting comparative analyses of issues on a regional and sub-regional basis,” Ajayi said.

Scientists agree that there is need for immediate action. Technical officer in Jamaica’s Climate Change Division, Dr. Orville Grey, told reporters recently at the Jamaica Observer’s weekly exchange: “If you look at what is happening with sea surface temperatures, you’ll see that we are losing our corals through the warming of the oceans.”

He continued, “With the projections, we’re looking at almost total loss of our corals. For us in the Caribbean our reefs are important, not from the perspective of tourism, but from the perspective of livelihoods when you consider fisheries”.

Murray pointed out that because the marine resources are shared, it is important that the Caribbean Community work together to implement supporting policies and agreements.

He noted, “The region has an action plan to address climate change in fisheries, but to be fully ready it has to be taken aboard by all stakeholders.”

There are also efforts to empower fisherfolk to access and share information that will enable them to participate in policy development at the local and regional levels. But fisherfolk are still not ready.

Mitchell Lay, coordinator of the Caribbean Network of Fisherfolk Organisations (CNFO), said, however, climate smarting is on the group’s agenda for 2015

Both governments and NGOs have upped their activities to protect the resources. But while the former has been slow to act at the national and regional levels, environmentalists are upping the ante by seeking protection for several species that are seen to be in need of protection.

Two years ago, U.S.-based WildEarth Guardian petitioned to have the Queen Conch listed as threatened or endangered under U.S. law. For Caribbean nations like the Turks and Caicos Islands, the Bahamas, Jamaica and Belize that depend on economically important species like conch and lobster, the ability to trade is critical to the local economies.

On Nov. 3, 2014 the NOAA denied the petition, but many believe regional trade of these species is on borrowed time, particularly as the effects of climate change grows.

“The CRFM Action Plan seeks to work towards a regional society and economy that is resilient to a changing climate and enhanced through comprehensive disaster management and sustainable use of aquatic resources,” Murray said.

He pointed to the five objectives of the plan, which among other things include actions to mainstream climate change adaptation into the sustainable development agendas of member states, and promoting actions to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and employing renewable and clean energy sources. Historically, however, the region has been slow to enact Community policies.

Key to successful climate smarting is the participation of the fisherfolk who have been the beneficiaries of several CTA-sponsored programmes to help them access information; assist them to become more efficient; and to enable them to engage in policy development at the local and regional levels.

The next steps are dependent on the implementation of relevant and necessary policies and the strengthening the legislation. Until then, fisherfolk and supporting institutions continue to wait.

Edited by Kitty Stapp

Workers use electricity and firewood to prepare cassava bread in Canaries, St. Lucia. The country’s government says renewable energy can help with value-added in the agricultural sector. Credit: Kenton X. Chance/IPS

By Kenton X. Chance
CASTRIES, Feb 25 2015 (IPS)

At Plas Kassav, a roadside outlet in Canaries, a rural community in western St. Lucia, a busload of visitors from other Caribbean countries, along with tourists from North America and Europe, sample the 12 flavours of freshly baked cassava bread on sale.

In the back of the shop, employees busily sift the grated cassava and prepare it for baking. Next to them, an electric motor powers a device that turns grated cassava as it bakes into farine — a cereal made from cassava tubers — in a wood-fired cauldron.Caribbean nations, with their fossil fuel-dependant economies, “don't want to be caught in a situation where today the price of oil is less than 50 dollars a barrel and tomorrow, if the Saudis and the other players decide, that the price of oil could go up to 120 dollars a barrel.” -- Minister James Fletcher

This is one of the ways in which this eastern Caribbean nation of 180,000 people is marrying its tourism and agriculture sectors.

Tourism makes the largest contribution to St. Lucia’s 1.3-billion-dollar economy. And with oil prices expected to continue falling for some time, this 617-square-kilometre island is hoping for significant economic growth on the heels of the slim years since the global financial crisis struck in 2008.

The government says that the move toward renewable energy will see businesses and households paying less for energy and will also strengthen the nation’s argument at the international climate change negotiations.

A renewable energy expert with the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA) tells IPS that falling oil prices present an excellent opportunity for small island developing states such as St. Lucia and its 14 other Caribbean Community (CARICOM) allies to accelerate their renewable energy programme.

“I think you can look at it as a windfall that buys you time for the transition,” Dolf Gielen says.

He tells IPS that falling oil prices will slow down but will not end the push towards clean energy.

“Oil prices will somewhat slow the acceleration but you will see a continued transition towards renewables,” he says. “Now you have a little more time to plan it and to make sure that it functions well.”

James Fletcher, St. Lucia’s Minister of Public Service, Sustainable Development, Energy, Science and Technology, tells IPS that he agrees that the region needs to accelerate its transition toward renewable energy, but is not certain whether lower fuel prices is really reason to exhale.

“I’m not sure about the breathing space. I think what it does, however, show is that this fuel price game is not one we want to be playing,” Fletcher tells IPS.

He notes that while the price of oil has fallen to 50 dollars a barrel — less than half of what it was half year ago — the decrease did not result from any advances in technology.

“The price of oil right now is being determined by the geopolitics of oil,” he says, noting that Saudi Arabia has increased its production in an effort to make production of shale oil in the United States and Canada less attractive.

Fletcher says that Caribbean nations, with their fossil fuel-dependant economies, “don’t want to be caught in a situation where today the price of oil is less than 50 dollars a barrel and tomorrow, if the Saudis and the other players decide, that the price of oil could go up to 120 dollars a barrel.”

Cruise in Castries Harbour, St. Lucia. The island is hoping to use renewable energy to fuel a greater part of its tourism sector. Credit: Kenton X. Chance/IPS

If the Caribbean is really serious about sustainable development and wants its economies to develop with some level of certainty, “we can’t be at the mercy of a widely fluctuating oil market,” Fletcher stresses.

“So, for me, what is happening in the oil market is reason why, as much as possible, we should get either out of it or insulate ourselves from it – and that’s why renewable energy makes so much sense to us.”

As opposed to dependence on oil, Fletcher says, if Caribbean countries are depending on renewable energy then there is “much more certainty” of what the price of energy will be.

“… With prices fluctuating so much not because of any huge difference in technology and any difference in supply in the Middle East or any glut in the supply market, I think that’s why we should be getting pursuing our renewable energies programme with more haste and more energy,” Fletcher tells IPS.

In St. Lucia, consumers pay 38 cents for one kilowatt-hour of electricity. The government hopes that its investments in renewable energy could see that price reduced to 30 cents.

St. Lucia is home to Sulphur Sprints, the “world’s only drive in volcano” — a smoking caldera located near Soufrière on the southwestern side of the island, where the natural heat boils the water and geysers shoot into the air at high tide and full moon.

St. Lucia hopes to generate up to 30 megawatts of electricity in Soufriere, home to Sulphur Springs, the “world’s only drive-in volcano”. Credit: Kenton X. Chance/IPS

It stands to reason that geothermal energy will be the nation’s focus as it pivots to renewable energy.

Fletcher tells IPS wind and solar PV are intermittent sources of energy “and we really can’t complete a transition away from fossil fuel based on intermittent sources, unless we invest heavily in storage, which we really don’t have the capacity to do right now.”

St. Lucia has received financial and technical support from the government of New Zealand, SIDS-DOCK, and the Global Environmental Facility to conduct the initial stage of exploration, which will start soon, Fletcher says.

LUCILEC, the state-owned power company in St. Lucia, will purchase the electricity from the power plant developer, ORMAK of Isreal, and resell it to consumers.

Fletcher tells IPS that the government is pleased with the pace of the negotiations but notes that developing geothermal potential takes time.

“But at least it puts us on track to developing what we believe is as much as 30 megawatts of geothermal energy in Soufriere,” he says.

And while geothermal energy has been identified as the booster that St. Lucia’s tourism industry has been longing for, exploiting that same renewable energy potential could deal a devastating blow to the nation’s tourism product.

“There is one little wrinkle in that, because the drive-in volcano is also located within the Piton Management Area, and the Piton Management Area is a UNESCO World Heritage Site and it is located in one of the policy areas where we are restricted in the level of infrastructural development that can take place,” Fletcher explains.

“So what we will be doing is looking at drill sites outside of the immediate vicinity of the drive-in volcano, but we are quite confident that we will have quite productive wells outside of that immediate area.”

St. Lucia is also exploring the development of a 12-megawatt wind farm on the island’s east cost and has been having discussion with an entity in the United States in this regard.

The third element of the renewable energy push is solar PV, the first stage of which will be done by LUCILEC, which has invited responses to proposal for a 1.2-megawatt facility in the south of St. Lucia, the intention being that it will be scaled up to 3 megawatts in the near future.

In this regard, the government is working with the Carbon War Room and the Clinton Initiative, which have been supporting the renewable energy programme.

Fletcher tells IPS that the move toward renewable energy, coupled with energy saving initiatives — such reducing from 4.0 million dollars to 2.6 million annually the amount spent on street lighting by switching to LED bulbs — will have a “tremendous” impact on St. Lucia.

The government is moving to make its own buildings more energy efficient, and will take to Parliament legislation to provide home and land tax, income tax rebate for people who are retrofitting their homes with energy efficient devices or installing grid-tie solar PV.

“What that does is many-fold. First of all, it causes our economic sector to be much more competitive,” Fletcher says, adding that a large portion of spending in the tourism sector is on energy.

“When you now superimpose on that the work we are doing with renewables, that, hopefully, will cause a reduction in the price of electricity from what it is right now, which 38 US cents per hour, to something approaching 30 cents. Then the expenditure by our hotels, by our manufacturing sector, the expenditure by people who are interested in value-added in agriculture, that expenditure goes down and it makes those sectors more competitive,” Fletcher tells IPS.

“On the household side, any money that is not being spent on energy is money that can be spent on something else. And so our focus is not just on the commercial establishments but also to get our residential consumers to benefit from the reduction in the cost of electricity, but also by putting in energy saving measures in their homes and giving them concessions to do that, that they will realise significant savings where their energy expenditure is concerned.”

Fletcher is one of St. Lucia’s and CARICOM’s negotiator at the global climate change talks, where the nations of the worlds are slated to sign a binding deal for reducing global warming in Paris later this year.

He tells IPS that at the international climate change negotiations, St. Lucia has been saying to developed countries that they have to reduce their emissions of greenhouse gases to keep global warming to two degrees above pre-industrial levels, as proposed by experts.

“Now, it strengthens our case. It strengthens our moral argument if we can say that a country like St. Lucia that contributes … something like 0.00078 per cent of all green house gases, we recognise the importance of this being a global effort and we are still committing to reducing our carbon footprint by 30, 40, 50 per cent.

“Then we believe that the big emitters, like the United States, like the European countries, like China, like Russia, that they also should be doing more to reduce their greenhouse emissions. So, I think it strengthens our hand in the international negotiations where climate change is concerned,” Fletcher tells IPS.

Edited by Kitty Stapp

The writer can be contacted at Kentonxtchance@gmail.com

Follow him on Twitter @KentonXChance

The Bahamas is focusing on renewable energy as it tries to preserve gains in tourism. Credit: Kenton X. Chance/IPS

By Kenton X. Chance
ABU DHABI, Jan 21 2015 (IPS)

When it comes to tourism in the 15-member Caribbean Community (CARICOM), The Bahamas — 700 islands sprinkled over 100,000 square miles of ocean starting just 50 miles off Florida — is a heavyweight.

With a gross domestic product of eight billion dollars, the Bahamian economy is almost twice the size of Barbados, another of CARICOM’s leading tourism destinations."Reducing our various countries’ dependence on fossil fuels, ramping up renewable energy, building more climate change resilience is incredibly important for us." -- Environment Minister Kenred M.A. Dorsett

Visitors are invited to “imagine a world where you can’t tell where dreams begin and reality ends.”

However, in the country’s Ministry of the Environment, officials have woken up to a reality that could seriously undermine the gains made in tourism and elsewhere: renewable energy development.

In 2014, in a clear indication of its intention to address its poor renewable energy situation, The Bahamas joined the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA).

The Abu Dhabi-based intergovernmental organisation supports countries in their transition to a sustainable energy future. IRENA also serves as the principal platform for international cooperation, a centre of excellence, and a repository of policy, technology, resource and financial knowledge on renewable energy.

The Bahamas has also advanced its first energy policy, launched in 2013, and has committed to ramping up to a minimum of 30 per cent by 2033 the amount of energy it generates from renewable sources.

“Currently, we are debating in Parliament an amendment to the Electricity Act to make provision for grid tie connection, therefore making net metering a reality using solar and wind technology,” Minister of Environment and Housing Kenred M.A. Dorsett told IPS on the sidelines of Abu Dhabi Sustainability Week (ADSW).

ADSW is a global forum that unites thought leaders, policy makers and investors to address the challenges of renewable energy and sustainable development. The week includes IRENA’s Fifth Assembly, the World Future Energy Summit, and the International Water Summit.

But Dorsett was especially interested in the IRENA assembly, which took place on Jan. 17 and 18.

At the assembly, ministers and senior officials from more than 150 countries met to discuss what IRENA has described as the urgent need and increased business case for rapid renewable energy expansion.

Dorsett came to Abu Dhabi with a rather short shopping list for both his country and the CARICOM region, and says he did not leave empty-handed.

“Our involvement in IRENA is important because the world over is concerned with standardisation of technology to ensure that our citizens are not taken advantage of in terms of the technology we import as we advance the renewable energy sector,” he told IPS.

“We certainly were able to engage IRENA in discussions with respect to what the Bahamas is doing, and our next steps and they have indicated to us that they will be able to assist us on the issue of standardisation,” Dorsett tells IPS.

Minister of the Environment and Housing in The Bahamas, Kenred Dorsett. Credit: Kenton X. Chance/IPS

He says IRENA has developed a programme that looks at practical consideration for the implementation or ramping up of renewable energy, including assistance in developing regulations for ensuring that standards are maintained.

“So, I think from our perspective, it is clear to us that IRENA would be prepared to assist us on that particular issue, and I think that generally speaking, what I certainly found was that the meeting was very innovative, particularly in light of the fact that there was a lot of technical support for countries looking to implement or deploy renewable energy technologies,” he said of Bahamas-IRENA talks on the sidelines of the assembly.

Dorsett also wanted IRENA to devote some special attention to CARICOM, a group of 15 nations, mostly Caribbean islands, in addition to Belize, Guyana and Suriname.

At a side event — “Renewables in Latin America: Challenges and Opportunities” — ahead of the Assembly, there was no distinction between Caribbean and Latin American nations.

“… I think that’s very, very important for us as region, as we move to ensure that CARICOM itself is a region of focus for IRENA, that we are not consumed in the entire Latin America region and there is sufficient focus on us,” he told IPS ahead of the assembly.

Dorsett is now convinced that CARICOM positions will be represented as Trinidad and Tobago, another CARICOM member, and the Bahamas, have been elected to serve on IRENA Council in 2015 and 2016, respectively.

“We do know that deployment of renewable energy in our region is important, we are small island development states, we live in [low-lying areas] and sea level rise is a major issue for us in the Caribbean region.

“Therefore, reducing our various countries’ dependence on fossil fuels, ramping up renewable energy, building more climate change resilience is incredibly important for us,” he told IPS.

Meanwhile, Director-General of IRENA, Adnan Amin, said that his agency is “trying to develop a new type of institution for a new time”.

“We know that the islands’ challenges are very particular. We have developed a lot of expertise in doing that, and we know in a general sense the challenge they face is quite different from mainland Latin America,” Amin told IPS. “So we see them as logically separate entities in what kinds of strategies we will have.”

He says IRENA has been working in the Pacific islands — early members of the agency — and is moving into the Caribbean.

Adnan Amin, Director-General of the International Energy Agency, says the Caribbean has “particular” renewable energy considerations that are distinct from Latin America. Credit: Kenton X. Chance/IPS

IRENA is already working in the Caribbean nations of Antigua and Barbuda, Barbados, Grenada, and Jamaica, and this year agreed to lend St. Vincent and the Grenadines 15 million dollars to help fund its 10-15 megawatt geothermal power plant, expected to come on stream by 2018.

Dorsett is also pleased that at the assembly the Bahamian delegation was able to get a briefing on the advances of technology that stores electricity generated from renewable sources.

“That also can prove to be very important for us as many Caribbean counties are faced with addressing the issue of grid stability,” he told IPS, adding that the ability to have storage that is “appropriately priced and that works efficiently” can help the Bahamas to exceed the average of 20 to 40 per cent of electricity generated by renewable sources by many countries.

The Bahamas woke up to the realities of its poor renewable energy situation in 2013 when Guilden Gilbert, head the country’s Renewable Energy Association, decried the nation for not doing enough to advance renewable energy generation.

The call came after the release of a report by Castalia-CREF Renewable Energy Islands Index for the Caribbean, which ranked the Bahamas 26 out of 27 countries in the region for its progress and prospects in relation to renewable energy investments.

The 2012 edition of the same report had ranked The Bahamas 21 out of the 22 countries on the list.

In the two years leading up to the announcement of the “National Energy Policy & Grid Tie In Framework”, The Bahamas established an Energy Task Force responsible for advising on solutions to reducing the high cost of electricity in the country.

The government also eliminated tariffs on inverters for solar panels and LED appliances to ensure that more citizens would be able to afford these energy saving devices.

The government also advanced two pilot projects to collect data on renewable energy technologies. The first project provided for the installation of solar water heaters and the second project for the installation of photovoltaic systems in Bahamian homes.

Dorsett tells IPS that he thinks that it is “incredibly important” that CARICOM focuses on renewable energy generation.

“I think CARICOM, as a region, has to look at renewable energy sources to build a sustainable energy future for our region as well as to ensure that we build resilience as we address the issues of climate change,” he tells IPS.

However, in some CARICOM nations, there is a major hurdle that policy makers, such as Dorsett, will have to overcome before the bloc realises its full renewable energy potential.

“There are very special challenges in the Caribbean. For example, many of the utilities are foreign-owned and they negotiated 75-year-long, cast-iron guarantees on their existence,” Amin tells IPS.

“They were making money off diesel. They have no incentive to move to renewables, but we are moving ahead,” the IRENA chief says.

Edited by Kitty Stapp

The writer can be contacted at Kentonxtchance@gmail.com

Follow him on Twitter @KentonXChance

Huge boulders have been used to protect Jamaica's Palisadoes road which connects Port Royal and the Norman Manley International Airport. The road was previously blocked by storm surges. Credit: Desmond Brown/IPS

By Desmond Brown
KINGSTON, Jamaica, Nov 10 2014 (IPS)

As the clock counts down to the last major climate change meeting of the year, before countries must agree on a definitive new treaty in 2015, a senior United Nations official says members of the Alliance of Small Island Developing States (AOSIS) “need to be innovative and think outside the box” if they hope to make progress on key issues.

Dr. Arun Kashyap, U.N. resident coordinator and UNDP resident representative for Jamaica, said AOSIS has a significant agenda to meet at the 20th Conference of the Parties (COP20) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCC) in Lima, Peru, and “it would be its creativity that would facilitate success in arriving at a consensus on key issues.”"We think that if we walk away it will send a strong signal. It is the first time that we have ever attempted such type of an action, but we strongly believe that the need for having a new agreement is of such significance that that is what we would be prepared to do.” -- Jamaica’s lead climate negotiator, Clifford Mahlung

Kashyap cited the special circumstances of Small Island Developing States (SIDS) and their compelling need for adaptation and arriving at a viable mechanism to address Loss and Damage while having enhanced access to finance, technology and capacity development.

“A common agreed upon position that is acceptable across the AOSIS would empower the climate change division (in all SIDS) and reinforce its mandate to integrate implementation of climate change activities in the national development priorities,” Kashyap told IPS.

At COP17, held in Durban, South Africa, governments reached a new agreement to limit the emissions of greenhouse gases. They decided that the agreement with legal form would be adopted at COP21 scheduled for Paris in 2015, and parties would have until 2020 to enact domestic legislation for their ratification and entry into force of the treaty.

Decisions taken at COP19 in Warsaw, Poland, mandated the 195 parties to start the process for the preparation and submission of “Nationally determined Contributions”. These mitigation commitments are “applicable to all” and will be supported both for preparing a report of the potential activities and their future implementation.

The report should be submitted to the Secretariat during the first quarter of 2015 so as to enable them to be included in the agreement.

AOSIS is an inter-governmental organisation of low-lying coastal and small island countries established in 1990. Its main purpose is to consolidate the voices of Small Island Developing States to address global warming.

In October, Ngedikes “Olai” Uludong, the lead negotiator for AOSIS, outlined priorities ahead of the Dec. 1-12 talks.

She said the 2015 agreement must be a legally binding protocol, applicable to all; ambition should be in line with delivering a long term global goal of limiting temperature increases to below 1.5 degrees and need to consider at this session ways to ensure this; mitigation efforts captured in the 2015 agreement must be clearly quantifiable so that we are able to aggregate the efforts of all parties.

Uludong also called for further elaboration of the elements to be included in the 2015 agreement; the identification of the information needed to allow parties to present their intended nationally determined contributions in a manner that facilitates clarity, transparency, and understanding relative to the global goal; and she said finance is a fundamental building block of the 2015 agreement and should complement other necessary means of implementation including transfer of technology and capacity building.

Sixteen Caribbean countries are members of AOSIS. They have been meeting individually to agree on country positions ahead of a meeting in St. Kitts Nov. 19-20 where a Caribbean Community (CARICOM) strategy for the world climate talks is expected to be finalised.

But Jamaica has already signaled its intention to walk out of the negotiations if rich countries are not prepared to agree on a deal which will reduce the impacts of climate change in the Caribbean.

“We have as a red line with respect to our position that if the commitments with respect to reducing greenhouse gases are not of a significant and meaningful amount, then we will not accept the agreement,” Jamaica’s lead climate negotiator, Clifford Mahlung, told IPS.

“We will not accept a bad agreement,” he said, explaining that a bad agreement is one that does not speak adequately to reducing greenhouse gas emissions or the provision of financing for poorer countries. It is not yet a CARICOM position, he said, but an option that Jamaica would support if the group was for it.

“We don’t have to be part of the consensus, but we can just walk away from the agreement. We think that if we walk away it will send a strong signal. It is the first time that we have ever attempted such type of an action, but we strongly believe that the need for having a new agreement is of such significance that that is what we would be prepared to do,” Mahlung added.

The Lima talks are seen as a bridge to the agreement in 2015.

SIDS are hoping to get developed countries to commit to keeping global temperature rise to 1.5 degrees Celsius above preindustrial levels, but are prepared to accept a 2.0 degrees Celsius rise at the maximum. This will mean that countries will have to agree to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

Jamaica’s climate change minister described the December COP20 meeting as “significant,” noting that “the decisions that are expected to be taken in Lima, will, no doubt, have far-reaching implications for the decisions that are anticipated will be taken next year during COP 21 in Paris, when a new climate agreement is expected to be formulated.”

Pickersgill said climate change will have devastating consequences on a global scale even if there are significant reductions in greenhouse gas emissions.

“It is clear to me that the scientific evidence that climate change is a clear and present danger is now even stronger. As such, the need for us to mitigate and adapt to its impacts is even greater, and that is why I often say, with climate change, we must change.”

But Pickersgill said there are several challenges for Small Island Developing States like Jamaica to adapt to climate change.

“These include our small size and mountainous terrain, which limits where we can locate critical infrastructure such as airports as well as population centres, and the fact that our main economic activities are conducted within our coastal zone, including tourism, which is a major employer, as well as one of our main earners of foreign exchange,” he said.

“The agriculture sector, and in particular, the vulnerability of our small farmers who are affected by droughts or other severe weather events such as tropical storms and hurricanes, and our dependency on imported fossil fuels to power our energy sources and drive transportation.”

Pickersgill told IPS on the sidelines of Jamaica’s national consultation, held here on Nov. 6, that his country’s delegation will, through their participation, work towards the achievement of a successful outcome for the talks.

Edited by Kitty Stapp

The writer can be contacted at destinydlb@gmail.com

As concern mounts over food security, two community groups are on a drive to mobilise average people across Antigua and Barbuda to mitigate and adapt in the wake of global climate change, which is affecting local weather patterns and by extension, agricultural production.

“I want at least 10,000 people in Antigua and Barbuda to join with me in this process of trying to mitigate against the effects of climate change,” Dr. Evelyn Weekes told IPS.

Bhimwattie Sahid picks a papaya in her backyard garden in Guyana. Food security is a growing concern for the Caribbean as changing weather patterns affect agriculture. Credit: Desmond Brown/IPS

“I am choosing the area of agriculture because that is one of the areas that will be hardest hit by climate change and it’s one of the areas that contribute so much to climate change.

“I plan to mobilise at least 10,000 households in climate action that involves waste diversion, composting and diversified ecological farming,” said Weekes, who heads the Aquaponics, Aquaculture and Agro-Ecology Society of Antigua and Barbuda.

She said another goal of the project is “to help protect our biodiversity, our ecosystems and our food security” by using the ecosystem functions in gardening as this would prevent farmers from having to revert to monocrops, chemical fertilisers and pesticide use.

Food security is a growing concern, not just for Antigua and Barbuda but all Small Island Developing States (SIDS), as changing weather patterns affect agriculture.

Scientists are predicting more extreme rain events, including flooding and droughts, and more intense storms in the Atlantic in the long term.

Weekes said the projects being proposed for smallholder farmers in vulnerable areas would be co-funded by the Global Environment Facility Small Grants Programme (GEF SGP).

“Our food security is one of the most precious things that we have to look at now and ecologically sound agriculture is what is going to help us protect that,” Weekes said.

“I am appealing to churches, community groups, farmers’ groups, NGOs, friendly societies, schools, etc., to mobilise their members so that we can get 10,000 or more people strong trying to help in mitigating and adapting to climate change.”

Dr. Weekes explained that waste diversion includes redirecting food from entering the Cooks landfill in a national composting effort.

“Don’t throw kitchen scraps in your garbage because where are they going to end up? They are going to end up in the landfill and will cause more methane to be released into the atmosphere,” she said.

Methane and carbon dioxide are produced as organic matter decomposes under anaerobic conditions (without oxygen), and higher amounts of organic matter, such as food scraps, and humid tropical conditions lead to greater gas production, particularly methane, at landfills.

As methane has a global warming potential 72 times greater than carbon dioxide, composting food scraps is an important mitigation activity. Compost can also help reconstitute degraded soil, thus boosting local agriculture.

Pamela Thomas, who heads the Caribbean Farmers Network (CaFAN), said her organisation recently received approval for climate smart agriculture projects funded by GEF.

“So we intend to do agriculture in a smart way. By that I mean protected agriculture where we are going to protect the plants from the direct rays of the sun,” Thomas, who also serves as Caribbean civil society ambassador on agriculture for the United Nations, told IPS.

“Also, we are going to be harvesting water…and we are going to use solar energy pumps to pump that water to the greenhouse for irrigation.”

CaFAN represents farmers in all 15 Caribbean Community (CARICOM) countries. Initiated by farmer organisations across the Caribbean in 2002, it is mandated to speak on behalf of its membership and to develop programmes and projects aimed at improving livelihoods; and to collaborate with all stakeholders in the agriculture sector to the strategic advantage of its farmers.

“If a nation cannot feed itself, what will become of us?” argued Thomas, who said she wants to see more farmers moving away from the use of synthetic fertilisers and pesticides and begin to look towards organic agriculture.

Antigua and Barbuda led the Caribbean in 2013 as the biggest per capita food importer at 1,170 dollars, followed by Barbados at 1,126 dollars, the Bahamas at 1,106 dollars and St. Lucia at 969 dollars.

Besides the budget expense, import dependency is a source of vulnerability because severe hurricanes can interrupt shipments. As such, agriculture is an important area of funding for the GEF SGP.

GEF Chief Executive Officer Dr. Naoko Ishii, who met with the Caribbean delegation during the United Nations Conference on Small Islands Developing States held in Apia, Samoa from Sep. 1-4, had high praise for the community groups in the region.

“I was quite impressed by their determination to fight against climate change and other challenges,” Ishii told IPS. “I was also very much excited and impressed by them taking a more integrated approach than any other part of the world.”

The GEF Caribbean Constituency comprises Antigua and Barbuda, Bahamas, Barbados, Belize, Cuba, Dominica, Dominican Republic, Grenada, Guyana, Haiti, Jamaica, St. Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, St Vincent and the Grenadines, Trinidad and Tobago and Suriname.

Ishii was also “quite excited” about the participation of eight countries in the Caribbean Challenge Initiative, a large-scale project spurred on by the Nature Conservancy, which has invested 20 million dollars in return for a commitment from Caribbean countries to support and manage new and existing protected areas.

Member countries must protect 20 percent of their marine and coastal habitats by 2020. The Bahamas, the Dominican Republic, Jamaica, Saint-Vincent and the Grenadines, Saint-Lucia, Grenada, Antigua and Barbuda as well as Saint-Kitts and Nevis are already involved in the project.

Ishii said that a number of countries involved in the Caribbean Challenge have been granted GEF funds and there are four GEF projects supporting the Caribbean Challenge.

These are durable funding and management of marine ecosystems in five countries belonging to the Organisation of Eastern Caribbean States (OECS); building a sustainable national marine protected area network for the Bahamas; rethinking the national marine protected area system to reach financial sustainability in the Dominican Republic; and strengthening the operational and financial sustainability of the national protected area system in Jamaica.

Edited by Kitty Stapp

The writer can be contacted at destinydlb@gmail.com

Ruth Osman, a 35-year-old Guyanese migrant living in Trinidad and Tobago, is one of thousands of women to have taken advantage of CARICOM’s migration scheme for skilled workers. Courtesy of Ruth Osman

By Jewel Fraser
PORT OF SPAIN, Sep 25 2014 (IPS)

Ruth Osman is attractive and well-groomed in tailored slacks and a patterned blouse, topped by a soft jacket worn open. Her demeanour and polished accent belie the stereotypical view that most Caribbean nationals have of Guyanese migrants.

As a Guyanese migrant living in Trinidad, the 35-year-old is one of thousands of Guyanese to have taken the plunge over the past decade, since the free movement clause of the CARICOM Single Market and Economy (CSME) regime granted skilled persons the right to move and work freely throughout the region.

According to a recent report, Trinidad and Tobago hosts 35.4 percent of migrants in the region. The United Nations’ ‘Trends in International Migrant Stock: The 2013 Revision’ states that Latin America and the Caribbean host a total migrant stock of 8.5 million people.

“Although, historically it is persons at the lower end of the socioeconomic scale in Caribbean society that have been the main movers, the CSME has to date facilitated the movement of those at the upper end, the educated elite in the region.” -- CARICOM Secretariat Report, 2010
Women make up 51.6 percent of migrants in the Caribbean, according to the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD)’s 2013 figures.

For many Guyanese, the decision to move on the strength of promises made by Caribbean Community (CARICOM) governments to facilitate free movement of skilled labour within the region has met with mixed degrees of success and, in some cases, outright harassment and even threats of deportation from the Caribbean countries to which they have migrated.

A 2013 report by the ACP Observatory on Migration states, “Guyanese migrants in Trinidad and Tobago faced unfavourable opinions in the social psyche and this could translate into tacit and other forms of discrimination.”

The report, prepared by the regional consulting firm Kairi Consultants, goes on to state that migrants from Guyana were “assumed to be menial labourers or undocumented workers.”

Guyana is one of the poorest countries in the CARICOM region, with a gross domestic product (GDP) per capita of 6,053 dollars in 2011. This stands in contrast to Trinidad and Tobago’s per-capita GDP of 29,000 dollars, according to the 2010-2011 U.N. Human Development Report (HDR).

But Osman’s background is not one of destitution. She applied for a CARICOM skills certificate in 2005, having completed a postgraduate diploma in Arts and Cultural Enterprise Management (ACEM) at the St. Augustine campus of the University of the West Indies (UWI) in Trinidad.

“I considered myself an artist, which is why I came to study here [for the ACEM] and I thought it a great stepping stone in my realising that dream of being a singer, songwriter, performer […]. Trinidad seems to be, in relation to where I came from, a more fertile ground for [what] I wanted to do,” she said.

Osman has her own band and performs as a jazz singer at nightspots in Trinidad and Tobago. During the day, she works as a speechwriter for Trinidad and Tobago’s Minister of Public Utilities.

Still, she misses the support network that her parents’ substantial contacts would have provided her in Guyana, and she acknowledges that her standard of living is also probably lower than it would have been if she were back home. But, she said, the move was necessary.

Osman’s story is in line with the findings of a 2010 CARICOM Secretariat report to “assess the impact of free movement of persons and other forms of migration on member states”, which found: “Although, historically it is persons at the lower end of the socioeconomic scale in Caribbean society that have been the main movers, the CSME has to date facilitated the movement of those at the upper end, the educated elite in the region.”

Limited educational opportunities also explain the wave of migration out of Guyana, a finding borne out by the experience of Miranda La Rose, a senior reporter with one of Trinidad and Tobago’s leading newspapers, ‘Newsday’, who holds a Bachelor’s degree in political science.

“I came here with the intention of working to help fund [my daughter’s] studies,” La Rose told IPS. “I was working for a fairly good salary in Guyana. My objective [in moving to Trinidad] was to improve my children’s education.”

She said the move to Trinidad was painless, since she was granted her CARICOM skills certificate within three weeks of applying, and she has amassed a circle of friends in Trinidad that compensates for the family she left behind in Guyana.

But not all stories of migration are happy ones. Some, like Alisa Collymore, represent the pains experienced by those with limited skills and qualifications.

Collymore, who now works as a nursing assistant with a family in Trinidad, applied for a CARICOM skills certificate under the entertainer category, because she had experience in songwriting and performing in Guyana.

However, she holds no tertiary qualifications in the field and only completed her secondary school education after she became an adult.

The Trinidadian authorities declined to grant her the CARICOM skills certificate and she has to apply for a renewal of her work permit every six months.

She said, “The treatment you get [is not what you] expected […] and the hand of brotherhood is not really extended. You feel like you are an outsider.”

Nevertheless, she said, the move has brought economic benefits. As a single, divorced, mother of three, she had struggled financially in Guyana. Since moving to Trinidad, her financial situation has improved, she said.

Though some studies have found negative impacts of the free skills movement on source countries, many are finding in the CARICOM scheme a chance to start a new – and often better – life.

Edited by Kanya D’Almeida

This story originally appeared in a special edition TerraViva, ‘ICPD@20: Tracking Progress, Exploring Potential for Post-2015’, published with the support of UNFPA, the United Nations Population Fund. The contents are the independent work of reporters and authors.

Workmen clear a road blocked by a landslide in Trinidad. Compensation for loss and damage from climate change has become a major demand of developing countries. Credit: Desmond Brown/IPS

By Desmond Brown
BRIDGETOWN, Barbados, Mar 24 2014 (IPS)

Can Caribbean governments take legal action against other countries that they believe are warming the planet with devastating consequences?

A former regional diplomat argues the answer is yes. Ronald Sanders, who is also a senior research fellow at London University, says such legal action would require all Small Island Developing States (SIDS) acting together."There is a moral case to be raised at the United Nations...It would require great leadership, great courage and great unity." -- Ronald Sanders

He believes the Hague-based International Court of Justice (ICJ) would be amenable to hearing their arguments, although the court’s requirement that all parties to a dispute agree to its jurisdiction would be a major stumbling block.

“It is most unlikely that the countries that are warming the planet, which incidentally now include India and China, not just the United States, Canada and the European Union…[that] they would agree to jurisdiction,” Sanders told IPS.

“The alternative, if countries wanted to press the issue of compensation for the destruction caused by climate change, is that they would have to go to the United Nations General Assembly.”

Sanders said that the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) countries could “as a group put forward a resolution stating the case that they do believe, and there is evidence to support it, that climate change and global warming is having a material effect… on the integrity of their countries.

“We’re seeing coastal areas vanishing and we know that if sea level rise continues large parts of existing islands will disappear and some of them may even be submerged, so the evidence is there.”

Sanders pointed to the damaging effects of flooding and landslides in St. Vincent and the Grenadines, St. Lucia, and Dominica as 2013 came to an end.

The prime minister of St. Vincent and the Grenadines, Dr. Ralph Gonsalves, described the flooding and landslides as “unprecedented” and gave a preliminary estimate of damage in his country alone to be in excess of 60 million dollars.

“People who live in the Caribbean know from their own experience that climate change is real,” Sanders said.

“They know it from days and nights that are hotter than in the past, from more frequent and more intense hurricanes or freak years like the last one when there were none, from long periods of dry weather followed by unseasonal heavy rainfall and flooding, and from the recognisable erosion of coastal areas and reefs.”

For the first time in several years, Antigua’s main water source, Potworks Reservoir, has run out of water as drought continues. Credit: Desmond Brown/IPS

At the U.N. climate talks in Warsaw last November, developing countries fought hard for the creation of a third pillar of a new climate treaty to be finalised in 2015. After two weeks and 36 straight hours of negotiations, they finally won the International Mechanism for Loss and Damage (IMLD), to go with the mitigation (emissions reduction) and adaptation pillars.

The details of that mechanism will be hammered out at climate talks in Bonn this June, and finally in Paris the following year. As chair of the Alliance of Small Island States (AOSIS), Nauru will be present at a meeting in New Delhi next week of the BASIC group (Brazil, South Africa, India and China) to try and build a common platform for the international talks.

“It isn’t just the Caribbean, of course,” Sanders said. “A number of other countries in the world – the Pacific countries – are facing an even more pressing danger than we are at the moment. There are countries in Africa that are facing this problem, and countries in Asia,” he told IPS.

“Now if they all join together, there is a moral case to be raised at the United Nations and maybe that is the place at which we would more effectively press it if we acted together. It would require great leadership, great courage and great unity,” he added.

Pointing to the OECD countries, Sir Ronald said they act together, consult with each other and come up with a programme which they then say is what the international standard must be and the developing countries must accept it.

“Why do the developing countries not understand that we could reverse that process? We can stand up together and say look, this is what we are demanding and the developed countries would then have to listen to what the developing countries are saying,” Sir Ronald said.

Following their recent 25th inter-sessional meeting in St. Vincent, Jamaican Prime Minister Portia Simpson Miller praised the increased focus that CARICOM leaders have placed on the issue of climate change, especially in light of the freak storm last year that devastated St. Lucia, Dominica and St. Vincent and the Grenadines.

At that meeting, heads of government agreed on the establishment of a task force on climate change and SIDS to provide guidance to Caribbean climate change negotiators, their ministers and political leaders in order to ensure the strategic positioning of the region in the negotiations.

In Antigua, where drought has persisted for months, water catchments are quickly drying up. The water manager at the state-owned Antigua Public utilities Authority (APUA), Ivan Rodrigues, blames climate change.

“We know that the climate is changing and what we need to do is to cater for it and deal with it,” he told IPS.

But he is not sold on the idea of international legal action against the large industrialised countries.

“I think what will cause [a reversal of their practices] is consumer activism,” he said. “The argument may not be strong enough for a court of law to actually penalise a government.”

But Sanders firmly believes an opinion from the International Court of Justice would make a huge difference.

“We could get an opinion. If the United Nations General Assembly were to accept a resolution that, say, we want an opinion from the International Court of Jurists on this matter, I think we could get an opinion that would be favourable to a case for the Caribbean and other countries that are affected by climate change,” he told IPS.

“If there was a case where countries, governments and large companies knew that if they continue these harmful practices, action would be taken against them, of course they would change their position because at the end of the day they want to be profitable and successful. They don’t want to be having to fight court cases and losing them and then having to pay compensation,” he added.

A man stands outside the ruins of a house in Buccament Bay, on St. Vincent’s southwestern coast, Dec. 26, 2013. Nine people were killed by Christmas flooding in St. Vincent and the damages estimated at millions of dollars. Credit: Peter Richards/IPS

By Peter Richards
KINGSTOWN, St. Vincent, Mar 13 2014 (IPS)

Dr. Ralph Gonsalves, the prime minister of St. Vincent and the Grenadines, says the promises of money by the “biggest polluters in the world” for small island developing states (SIDS) like his to adapt to climate change are a mostly a “mirage”.

But as chair of the 15-member Caribbean Community (CARICOM) grouping, Gonsalves will be playing a lead role in getting the region to coordinate a united front on climate finance."The big polluters, they make commitments of all sorts of monies but it is a mirage and the closer you get to it you realise it is not there, it recedes." -- CARICOM Chair Ralph Gonsalves

“We agreed on the establishment of a task force on climate change and small island developing states to provide guidance to Caribbean climate change negotiators, their ministers and political leaders in order to ensure the strategic positioning of the region in the negotiations,” he told IPS following the CARICOM summit that ended here on Tuesday.

Gonsalves said the region is now preparing for two important meetings in September – the U.N. Climate Change Summit and the Third U.N. SIDS International Meeting in Samoa.

Guyanese President Donald Ramotar, who made a presentation at CARICOM’s closed-door summit, told IPS that it was important for the leaders themselves to get involved in the negotiations “and to make our voices heard on this matter, because as you know we have been the least contributors to climate change, but we are among the first to feel the big effects.”

Ramotar said the tragedy that occurred when a slow moving low-level trough hit St. Vincent and the Grenadines, Dominica and St. Lucia on Christmas Eve last year, killing more than a dozen people and leaving damages estimated at more than 100 million dollars, “is just the latest reminder how vulnerable our region is”.

The task force must now “find areas where CARICOM can agree on”, he said.

“This is a critical decision by heads [of state] at a time when efforts are underway through the U.N. to have a global climate change agreement by the end of 2015,” he said.

“We need to ensure that as a region, our voices are being heard on this important issue, and not only from our technical people, but from the collective political leadership in the region,” Ramotar said, stressing the need for a globally binding agreement.

“We have to ensure that we push for a climate change agreement by 2015 which is ambitious in terms of emission reduction targets and providing climate financing,” he added.

The communiqué that followed the summit here “lamented the fact that much of the promised resources had not been forthcoming but emphasised the need for the Caribbean Community Climate Change Centre (CCCCC) to work with member states in order to have projects prepared to access financing when it did become available.”

Guyana, for example, has been playing a lead role with regards to climate change, and priority projects on adaptation are outlined within its Low Carbon Development Strategy (LCDS), which seeks to address the effects of climate change while simultaneously encouraging economic development.

Gonsalves told IPS that on the question of adaptation, there is a whole menu of initiatives which have been established through discussions, technical reports and the like. What is needed most now is the money to pay for them.

“It is a lot a lot of money that is required so that is why…we have to work in a coordinated manner at the relevant international fora to see whether we could identify those areas where the money is more easily available for us to touch,” he told IPS.

“You get governments, the big polluters, they make commitments of all sorts of monies but it is a mirage and the closer you get to it you realise it is not there, it recedes.

“That’s the real difficulty with this and this is why we have to work better, harder on this because this is an exegetical issue it affects the very existence of our countries,” Gonsalves said.

Executive director of the CCCCC Dr. Kenrick Leslie says that waiting will only make solutions more costly.

“Climate change is here, you saw in terms of the frequency of extreme weather events, those are some of the indicators that the climate is changing. But more importantly, people don’t realise that the sea level is rising at this time, at a rate of five millimetres per year.

“They might say five millimetres, what is that? But in 10 years, five millimetrtes will become 50 millimetres, and in terms of the English system that’s two inches, in 30 years that is six inches, now consider the sea level rising a further six inches in Guyana or Suriname or Belize,” Leslie said.

“We need to have our political leaders become very knowledgeable of what is being negotiated…technical people can negotiate at the technical level but the final decisions are made at the political level, and therefore if our political leaders are not cognisant with what is going on, then we will fail in terms of getting what is needed for the adaptation that we have to make,” he told IPS.

Solar-powered lights have been installed along the road to the VC Bird International Airport in Antigua. Credit: Desmond Brown/IPS

By Desmond Brown
BRIDGETOWN, Barbados, Jan 28 2014 (IPS)

Despite having an abundance of wind and sunshine, Caribbean countries have found that going green is requiring significant shifts in policy, and most importantly, significant financing.

But despite these challenges, they are not daunted. Barbados, for instance, which spends an estimated 400 million dollars annually on fossil fuel imports, has announced plans for a wind, gas and solar energy programme that requires almost one billion dollars in investments.“The cost of renewables has fallen significantly and [they] are now for the most part cost competitive with traditional sources of energy." -- Selwin Hart

“Plans for the area include a 680-million-dollar waste-to-energy plant; a leachate treatment plant costing about 31.9 million dollars; a landfill gas-to-energy project to cost 9.4 million dollars; a solar project costing 120 million dollars; and a wind-to-energy facility projected to cost 24 million dollars,” said Environment Minister Dr. Denis Lowe.

The climate change financial adviser at the Barbados-based Caribbean Development Bank (CDB), Selwin Hart, said the region’s premiere financial institution has identified the promotion of renewable energy and increased energy efficiency as a strategic priority.

“The bank is in the process of developing an energy sector strategy and policy which will be finalised in 2014,” he told IPS.

“[But] we are not waiting until that policy is finalised for us to make the necessary interventions within borrowing member countries giving the priority and urgency attached to making these investments,” Hart noted.

“We will be supporting the policy and regulatory reforms that are necessary to ensure the deployment of renewable energy and energy efficiency technology.”

Citing the region’s “vulnerability to the negative effects of climate change”, Hart said the Caribbean must be in a position to secure some of the financing needed to help it cope, adapt and reduce vulnerabilities to the serious fall-out from the phenomenon.

“We are extremely vulnerable when it comes to the consequences of climate change and we must do everything to receive our fair share of the resources being made available,” he said.

Hart told IPS global investments in renewable energy and energy efficiency have quadrupled over the last decade and now stand at 244 billion dollars a year.

“The cost of renewables, and using solar, as an example, have fallen significantly and are now for the most part cost competitive with traditional sources of energy,” he said.

The International Energy Agency (IEA) in its World Energy Outlook 2013 conservatively estimated that by 2035, renewables will surpass coal as the main fuel for power generation.

In 2012, another Caribbean country, Belize, which currently generates 63 percent of its electricity from renewable energy sources, announced plans for a National Energy Policy and a Sustainable Energy Strategy.

“We have ambitious targets. We have set ourselves to change from fossil fuel to renewable energy and at the same time decrease our energy intensity,” Energy Minister Joy Grant told IPS.

“We are pursuing all types of renewable energy – hydro, bio energy, solar, ocean, thermal and wind and waste-to-energy,” Grant added.

But like all other small developing countries, Grant said Belize’s efforts in renewable energy were constrained by the high cost of renewable technologies; the lack of domestic capacity; inappropriate frameworks to incentivise the private sector to invest in renewable energy; and small population size.

Dominica’s Energy Minister Rayburn Blackmore said that 30 percent of his country’s energy consumption comes from hydro, and last year it spent 51.6 million dollars to import fuel for energy generation.

“The consumer pays over 30 percent of that in what is being called fuel surcharge. The consumer pays an average of 1.17 dollars per kilowatt hour,” he told IPS.

“From our standpoint in Dominica, we believe as a government and as a people that we must do something, once and for all,” he said.

Blackmore said Dominica was now moving into geothermal production with the hope of cutting the price of electricity to the consumer by 40 percent in the first instance when a 15MW power plant now being constructed is rolled out.

“Our ultimate goal of geothermal production we will also be contributing to the global effort to combat climate change,” he said.

The programme manager for Energy at the Guyana-based Caribbean Community (CARICOM) Secretariat, Joseph Williams, agreed that the cost of energy is just too prohibitive to achieve the economic growth and poverty reduction needed in the region.

“When one looks at the problems currently faced by the Caribbean it is important to note that the cost of electricity is two to three times that of other countries in the Latin American and Caribbean region,” Williams said, adding that this “represents a tremendous drag, not only on the ordinary household but on businesses and commercial activity within our region.”

Opposition legislator Gaston Browne told IPS Antigua and Barbuda presently has the highest cost of electricity in the Organisation of Eastern Caribbean States (OECS), exclusive of taxes, even though it uses cheaper heavy fuel.

“We also have the worst ratio of fossil fuel generation versus renewables in the OECS,” he said.

Browne wants to see a diversification into renewable energy “with a view of having 25 percent renewable energy” within five years.

He told IPS his Antigua Labour Party would modernise the Antigua Public Utilities Authority “into a more efficient entity, thereby reducing the burden that unreasonably high cost of energy imposes on industry, commerce and residential consumers” when compared to Antigua’s OECS neighbours.

In August 2013, Antigua began the installation of solar-powered lights in the east of the island.

A government statement said the lights were intended to serve as a practical demonstration of the use of the nation’s renewable energy resources.

The CARICOM Energy Programme was established in April 2008 within the Directorate of Trade and Economic Integration to provide greater focus on energy matters in CARICOM towards development of the energy sector in the region.

Williams said the Caribbean is on the right track, putting in place a CARICOM Energy Policy and establishing targets for renewable energy in the electricity sector, while a number of the countries have advanced the whole question of policy at the national level.

“It has taken some time but we are making progress,” he told IPS.

Residents stand on a bridge destroyed by massive flooding in St. Vincent. Credit: Desmond Brown/IPS

By Desmond Brown
CASTRIES, St. Lucia, Jan 7 2014 (IPS)

Guyanese President Donald Ramotar says the death and destruction caused by intense rainfall in three Caribbean Community (CARICOM) countries over the Christmas holidays is a sign that the region has no time to lose in fortifying its resiliance to climate change.

A slow-moving, low-level trough on Dec. 24 dumped hundreds of millimetres of rain on St. Vincent and the Grenadines, St. Lucia and Dominica, killing at least 13 people. Following the deadly floods and landslides, the Guyanese government approved financial support of 100,000 dollars each for St. Lucia and St. Vincent and 75,000 to Dominica.“The damage unleashed by the trough [on]…that dreadful night has been extensive and severe." -- Prime Minister Dr. Kenny Anthony

“The scientific evidence is showing that for our region, which is one of the most vulnerable, these weather events will become more frequent as the impacts of global climate change intensify,” Ramotar told IPS.

Guyana’s coastal plains are approximately six feet below sea level.

“Recognising our own vulnerabilities here in Guyana, efforts will intensify in 2014 to improve and expand infrastructure, in particular our sea and river defence and drainage and irrigation systems; enhance our forecasting capabilities and response mechanisms, and build climate resilience in the social and productive sectors of our economy,” he said.

The Guyanese president said these steps will be taken within the framework of the country’s Low Carbon Development Strategy (LCDS).

The LCDS, a brainchild of former president Bharrat Jagdeo, sets out a vision to forge a new low-carbon economy in Guyana over the coming decade. It has received acclaim globally, and is now in the implementation stage.

Ramotar said the time for urgent action is now, citing “millions of dollars in damage and loss of life” resulting from extreme weather events.

In St. Lucia – one of three Organisation of Eastern Caribbean States (OECS) countries that felt the most severe impact of the Dec. 24 floods – Prime Minister Dr. Kenny Anthony said that while the full economic cost of the storm has not yet been determined, it is clear that reconstruction will run into several hundred million dollars.

“The damage unleashed by the trough [on]…that dreadful night has been extensive and severe,” he told IPS.

“We now know that some 10 homes were completely destroyed by the raging floods. Agriculture has suffered badly. According to initial estimates there was 30-40 percent damage to banana fields, 90 percent damage to vegetables and five percent damage to tree crops.”

Anthony told IPS that 90 percent of all ponds have suffered “varying degrees of siltation” and shrimp, fish and livestock have been lost.

“Our infrastructure, some of which was already compromised by Hurricane Thomas [in 2010] has taken a further battering,” he said.

St. Lucia’s minister of sustainable development, Dr. James Fletcher, told IPS that the catastrophic events brought about by climate change caused severe infrastructural and psychological damage.

“These extreme weather events are quite traumatic for us, both on our psyche and on our national purse…but this is what climate change is bringing to us and this is what we have to unfortunately look forward to,” he told IPS.

At the same time, Fletcher said citizens and commercial enterprises must do a better job of solid waste management, since the indiscriminate disposal of garbage clogs waterways and causes serious problems.

“Some people treat the rivers as garbage disposal sites. This is something that we have to pay close attention to,” he told IPS.

The Caribbean Disaster Emergency Management Agency (CDEMA) said it continues to be in contact with the affected countries and is coordinating the response and recovery support. CDEMA is assisting the three impacted states in developing proposals to access the Caribbean Development Bank (CDB) Emergency Response Grant facility and the Emergency Recovery Loan facility.

The government of Barbados is making available a coast guard vessel to assist in transporting emergency supplies to St. Lucia and St. Vincent and the Grenadines. The “Trident” is capable of transporting more than four tonnes of cargo at one time.

In Dominica, where 65 households were affected by flooding, disaster officials estimate that 1.13 million dollars is required for immediate clean-up.

Prime Minister Anthony said the government of St. Kitts and Nevis has dispatched via the Eastern Caribbean Central Bank 1.36 million dollars as a donation to assist St. Lucia with its recovery efforts.

Britain is also providing 1.36 million dollars for vital emergency humanitarian support to St. Vincent and the Grenadines and St. Lucia.

British Minister of State for International Development Alan Duncan is visiting the region, and is meeting with the prime ministers of the two affected countries to discuss the humanitarian situation and reconstruction needs.

The newest report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) said the ability of tourism-dependent Caribbean destinations like Barbados, Belize, Jamaica and the Bahamas, among others, to provide not only for their residents, but for the many thousands of visitors demanding water, energy, and other natural resources, is in jeopardy.

“As severe storms, drought, hurricanes, and other climate challenges rise to the forefront of issues being addressed by CARICOM countries, emerging data sheds new light on the future challenges in store for the islands and coastal nations throughout the region,” the report noted.

At the bustling border of the Dominican Republic and Haiti. Credit: Dan Boarder/cc by 2.0

By Peter Richards
PORT OF SPAIN, Nov 27 2013 (IPS)

Outraged at a court ruling that would potentially render stateless thousands of Dominican people of Haitian descent, the Caribbean Community on Tuesday suspended the Dominican Republic’s bid to join the 15-member regional grouping.

Dominican President Danilo Medina had reportedly promised that his government would not actually deport any of the persons affected by the Sep. 23 ruling.“It renders an already marginalised section of the Dominican population even more vulnerable to acts of daily discrimination and abuse." -- Prof. Norman Girvan

However, Michel Martelly, Haiti’s president, said that soon after returning from Venezuela last weekend where he held talks with Dominican officials to resolve the issue, the authorities in Santo Domingo deported 300 people “who do not know the country, who do not have family in Haiti and who do not even speak the language.”

Martelly is threatening to stay away from future talks – the next round is scheduled for next week – if the Dominican Republic does not show some form of goodwill.

“We don’t have to keep meeting without them showing some action,” he told IPS, adding that the deportees included children, some “as old as one day”.

Trinidadian Prime Minister and CARICOM chair Kamla Persad-Bissessar vowed to raise the matter with the Association of Caribbean States (ACS) and the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC). A delegation from the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) is also visiting the Dominican Republic early next month.

“It is especially repugnant that the ruling ignores the 2005 recommendations made by the IACHR that the Dominican Republic adapts its immigration laws and practices in accordance with the provisions of the American Convention on Human Rights,” she said. “The ruling also violates the Dominican Republic’s international human rights obligations.”

St. Vincent and the Grenadines Prime Minister Dr. Ralph Gonsalves, who had written two letters to President Medina on the issue, said he was also prepared to push for the suspension of the Dominican Republic from the Bolivarian Alliance for the Americas and the Caribbean Forum (CARIFORUM).

He told IPS that “quiet diplomacy” has led nowhere and “clearly we have to up the ante for the government and the relevant authority to act”.

At the heart of the controversy is the stripping of citizenship from children of Haitian migrants. The decision applies to those born after 1929 — a category that overwhelmingly includes descendants of Haitians brought in to work on farms.

CARICOM had come under increasing pressure from civil society groups in the region to respond strongly. Caribbean organisations that met in Colombia last week condemned the ruling as “immoral, unjust and totally unacceptable”.

“It renders an already marginalised section of the Dominican population even more vulnerable to acts of daily discrimination and abuse based on the colour of their skin and/or the sound of their names,” former ACS secretary general Professor Norman Girvan told IPS.

Caricom has an opportunity to “prevent a humanitarian catastrophe,” he said.

But efforts to pressure the Dominican Republic to soften the ruling – only the latest salvo in decades of cultural and economic tensions between the two nations – will likely prove an uphill task.

Earlier this month, Anibal De Castro, the Dominican Republic’s ambassador to the United Sates, responding to an article published in a Trinidad and Tobago newspaper, made it clear that his country “does not grant citizenship to all those born within its jurisdiction.”

“In fact, the United States is one of the few nations that maintain this practice. In most countries, it is the norm that citizenship be obtained by origin or conferred under certain conditions. Since 1929, the Constitution of the Dominican Republic has established that the children of people in transit, a temporary legal status, are not eligible for Dominican citizenship,” he wrote.

On Nov. 6, hundreds of people rallied in Santo Domingo in support of the ruling, even suggesting the erection of a wall to ensure the division of Hispaniola that is shared by Haiti and the Dominican Republic.

Emilo Santana of the group Night Watch of San Juan claimed that many Dominicans were unable to receive health services because the resources were being used to assist Haitians and urged President Medina to prevent a “silent and massive Haitian take-over of the territory.”

“I feel humiliated and angry, but not by my president, I feel humiliated by those NGOs that negotiate with the poverty of Haitians and it is they who are destroying our country,” Santana said at the rally.

Another speaker, jurist Juan Manuel Castillo Pantaleon, said the Constitutional Court “has aroused all Dominicans to defend as one man our national sovereignty”.

He described the ruling as a landmark “because it clearly defines who we Dominicans are and reaffirms the laws and institutions, as provided in the Constitution.

“The hypocritical international community which offered aid to Haiti never kept their promises and in some cases committed robbery, and intends that we Dominicans should assume responsibility for a failed state,” said Castillo Pantaleon.

A United Nations-supported study released this year estimated that there were around 210,000 Dominican-born people of Haitian descent and another 34,000 born to parents of other nationalities.

The government of the Dominican Republic estimates that around 500,000 people born in Haiti live in the Dominican Republic.

In a statement, CARICOM said it was calling on the global community to pressure the Dominican Republic to “adopt urgent measures to ensure that the jaundiced decision of the Constitutional Court does not stand”.

“The government must show good faith by immediate credible steps as part of an overall plan to resolve the nationality and attendant issues in the shortest possible time.”

The slaves brought to the Caribbean lived in inhumane conditions. Above are examples of slave huts in Bonaire provided by Dutch colonialists. About five feet tall and six feet wide, two to three slaves slept in these after working in near by salt mines. Credit: V.C.Vulto/GNU license

By Peter Richards
PORT OF SPAIN, Trinidad, Jul 29 2013 (IPS)

As Caribbean countries prepare to observe Emancipation Day on Aug. 1, they are also caught up in an ongoing debate over reparations for slavery.

St. Vincent and the Grenadines Prime Minister Dr. Ralph Gonsalves, who has stated publicly that he will “take no quarter on those issues”, told IPS, “We have in my view a very strong case to put to an appropriate tribunal.”

Last week, as he addressed an audience in Cuba marking the 60th anniversary of the attack on the Moncada Barracks that launched the 1953 Revolution, Gonsalves said the Caribbean is demanding reparations from Europe for native genocide and African slavery.

“The principal reason for underdevelopment in the Caribbean and Latin America is the legacy of native genocide and African slavery, and we do so with the spirit and with the examples, in this new period, of the combatants of Moncada,” he said.

At the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) summit here earlier this month, Gonsalves presented his fellow leaders with three position papers, including one by Professor Hilary Beckles, the pro-vice Chancellor of the University of the West Indies, who recently published the book “Britain’s Black Debt: Reparations owed the Caribbean for Slavery and Indigenous Genocide”.

Gonsalves is pushing for a common position on reparations and has welcomed the decision to establish a committee under the chairmanship of the Barbados Prime Minister Freundel Stuart to drive the issue.

The committee, which will oversee the work of a CARICOM Reparations Commission, will include Trinidad and Tobago, Guyana, Haiti, St. Vincent and the Grenadines and Suriname, the chairs of national reparations committees, and a representative of the University of the West Indies.

Kafra Kambon, chair of the Emancipation Support Committee in Trinidad and Tobago, told IPS it is important for non-governmental organisations and the Caribbean population in general to support the initiatives of regional governments.

Kambon, whose grouping organises the annual Emancipation Day activities here, said that the support is necessary since he believes “European governments are going to try to corral them [Caribbean leaders] or even pressure them to abandon the idea.

”We have to give the strength to that call for reparations as a principle,” Kambon told IPS, calling the slave trade “massive crimes that go beyond the human imagination”.

“People have been damaged psychologically, we came out of slavery suffering extreme trauma,” he said.

“We were not behind Europe at the time of the contact and some people think of slavery as a rescue mission. It was not,” he said, adding that “slavery represents a generation of people that have been wiped out”.

In the Dutch country of Suriname, the National Reparations Committee said it would seek consensus and awareness for the correct version of history.

“We’re going to bring this dead information about reparations for slavery and about the genocide of our country’s first inhabitants to life,” said the committee’s chair, Armand Zunder, who has applauded the move by CARICOM.

“We thought we would be fighting this fight on our own, but we know now we have full support. We have made big strides,” said Zunder, an economist, who earlier this month filed the first ever petition to The Netherlands for reparations to the descendants of slaves in Suriname.

Zunder said that previously published research results that showed that the Netherlands earned some 125 billion euros from Suriname during slavery.

Meanwhile, the Pan-Afrikan Reparations Coalition in Europe (PARCOE) has written a lengthy letter to Caribbean leaders warning that their “top down approach” will “end up not achieving the reparations aspirations of the masses of Afrikan descendants and indigenous citizens in the Caribbean.”

PARCOE co-vice chairs Esther Stanford-Xosei and Kofi Mawuli Klu wrote that the Caribbean should seek to avoid “the same errors that were made with the former Organisation of African Unity’s (OAU) Group of Eminent Persons (GEP) in failing to effectively consult on reparations strategies, be informed by and act in the best interests of the various Afrikan countries respective citizenries”.

They cited the work of the U.S. activist and law professor, Mari Matsuda, who argues that approaches to reparations incorporate a more grassroots, “bottom-up” approach.

“By ‘bottom’, Matsuda refers to the lived experience of those individuals and groups who are alleging the violation of rights rather than those who have traditionally defined the scope of legal redress such as judges, lawyers associations and other groups who are part of upholding the existing social, legal and economic status quo,” they wrote.

PARCOE is also urging Caribbean countries not to be taken in by the recent “historic victory for the Mau Mau survivors of British colonial era torture and abuses in detention committed between 1952 and 1963 during Britain’s suppression of the Mau Mau war of liberation”.

PARCOE said the “the financial compensation aspect of the settlement represents a paltry sum and is not commensurate with the torture and suffering of Mau Mau patriots considering that the British Government paid out £20 million, the modern equivalent of around £16.5 billion, to compensate some 3,000 slaveholding families for the loss of their ‘property’ when slavery was purportedly abolished in Britain’s colonies in 1833.”

Severe flooding is one of many devastating effects of climate change, as the Caribbean island nation Dominica experienced in 2011. Credit: Desmond Brown/IPS

By Peter Richards
CASTRIES, St. Lucia, Jul 15 2013 (IPS)

If the studies conducted by the International Code Council (ICC) are true, then by 2025, Caribbean countries will witness a significant increase in Category 4 and 5 hurricanes from the present level of 1.4 annually to four.

And if the studies by the ICC – which focuses on safe building designs – are not frightening enough, another recent study conducted by the Mona campus of the University of the West Indies  is projecting an increase in rainfall during tropical storms and hurricanes.

Against this background, the Caribbean last Friday launched a seminal online support tool that it hopes will promote climate-smart development by helping to embed a risk management ethic in decision-making processes across the region.

“The timing of this launch is opportune. To begin with, it comes during the 2013 Tropical Atlantic hurricane season, which, according to scientific predictions, will see above-normal hurricane activity,” said St. Lucia’s Sustainable Development Minister Dr. James Fletcher.

Fletcher told IPS that the Caribbean can expect, due to climate change, an increase in the severity of hurricanes and, therefore, an increase in the ability of these weather systems to inflict serious harm on the region.

“Studies point, for example, to the future inundation of a number of sea ports and airports across the region and some estimates point to the cost of climate change claiming as much as 21 percent of gross national product (GDP) in some Caribbean countries by 2100.

“Already, constraints such as geographic location, small size and open and relatively undiversified economies have colluded to render our countries particularly susceptible to external shocks. Only now, climate change has superimposed another layer of risk as a result of sea level rise, elevated temperatures, changes in precipitation and more intense hurricanes,” he added.

The U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the Scripps Institute of Oceanography said recently that greenhouse gas concentrations in the earth’s atmosphere have crossed the 400 parts per million (ppm) threshold.

For many years, the Alliance of Small Island States (AOSIS) has been calling for greenhouse gas concentrations to be stabilised at well below 350 ppm in order to ensure that their countries are not swallowed by the rising seas.

“Now that our planet has achieved this dubious milestone, the outlook is for more pronounced, and prolonged, climate change,” Fletcher said.

Myrna Bernard of the Guyana-based Caribbean Community (CARICOM) Secretariat, who also spoke at the launch of the new initiative, said that a recent study conducted by the regional governments-owned Caribbean Catastrophe Risk Insurance Facility (CCRIF) indicates that losses caused by weather-related natural catastrophes in the Caribbean account for six percent of GDP and that figure could increase by as much as three percentage points by 2030.

The Belize-based Caribbean Community Climate Change Centre (CCCCC) has developed the Caribbean Climate Online Risk and Adaptation Tool (CCORAL) with funding from the United Kingdom Department for International Development (DFID) and the London-based Climate and Development Knowledge Network (CDKN) that operates in 40 countries trying to respond to the gap “of what we call climate compatible development”.

“We know climate change is a global phenomena, we know the provision of more public goods and knowledge around it is very critical at multiple levels, and I think this is a tool that can play a critical role in this,” said the CDKN’s Sam Bechoseth.

He said the passage of Tropical Storm Chantal through the Lesser Antilles last week “reminded me of some of the threats your region faces”.

“The point is we have to integrate climate change into our development trajectories. It is absolutely non-optional and we need risk assessment tools that can help us in that process.”

He told IPS that both the private and public sectors have long been assessing risks “but we need to look at this in a different way and in a different light in the face of the current and expected future impacts from climate change”.

CCCCC executive director Dr. Kenrick Leslie said the development of CCORAL is a direct response to one of the actions defined in the Regional Framework for Achieving Development Resilient to Climate Change.

The framework and the regional implement plan were endorsed by Caribbean governments between 2009 and 2012, and Leslie said CCORAL is a crucial element of the region’s emerging strong early action framework for building climate resilience.

“CCORAL will aid the region in defining approaches and solutions that will provide benefits now and in the future by adapting no-regret actions and flexible actions and flexible measures. CCORAL is a practical approach to cost-effective climate resilient investment projects,” he added.

CCCCC Programme Development Specialist Keith Nicholas, who was praised for his work with CCORAL, said “the development of the risk assessment tool emerged after an extensive consultative process with regional stakeholders to ensure authenticity, relevance and ownership”.

The CCCCC said that CCORAL will help boost the capacity of the Caribbean countries to assess their risk amidst a variable and changing climate, while creating pathways for the identification and implementation of adaptation and mitigation options.

In one of the brochures handed out at the launch of the project, the CCCCC noted that the pilot country participants involved in the development of CCORAL gave a clear message that the biggest driver and barrier to using the online tool in decision-making will “be a positive mandate from ministers, policy makers, politicians and senior government officials.

“This will only be secured if the economic, social, environmental and therefore political, challenges of current climate viability and climate change are recognised and acted upon as an integral element of national development planning.”

Bechoseth has described the CCORAL as a “fantastic tool” but warned that “a tool is only useful when we start to utilise it and turn it into solving real life problems”.

The Dominican Republic first expressed interest in joining the 15-member Caribbean integration grouping CARICOM in 1989. Now, 14 years later, the Spanish-speaking country with a population of nearly 10 million may finally get its wish.

Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro wants to see greater cooperation between his country and the 15-member Caribbean Community. Credit: Agência Brasil/cc by 3.0

In the words of President Danilo Medina, “We have come with open arms, promising to work hard to make the region a better place.”

Medina made his pitch to Caribbean Community leaders who met here over the past four days for their annual summit. He praised the “visionary leaders” from Barbados, Trinidad and Tobago, Guyana and Jamaica, who 40 years ago signed the Treaty of Chaguaramas that paved the way for the establishment of the regional integration movement.

“They built the foundation on sound principles which has allowed 15 full members and five associate members. We must have the political will and, therefore, we have decided to have open-arm dialogue to gain entry to CARICOM,” Medina said.

The new CARICOM chair and prime minister of Trinidad and Tobago, Kamla Persad Bissessar, said Caribbean leaders had some reservations related to immigration, as well market size in the context of the CARICOM Single Market and Economy (CSME) that allows for the free movement of goods, skills, labour and services across the region.

“I believe in principle that the heads [of state] were not adverse to the Dominican Republic joining. However, there remain issues some heads wanted clarification on and that matter has now been put forward to the inter-sessional [to be held in February] for a more targeted discussion,” she told IPS.

CARICOM leaders are concerned that with a population of 9.5 million, the Dominican Republic’s entry could adversely impact the economies of some of the smaller member countries, she added.

Medina was not the only visitor to the four-day summit here.

Newly elected Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro may not have the charisma so strongly associated with his predecessor, the late Hugo Chavez, but he too came to the summit promising “goodies” for regional leaders in a bid to solidify the relationships that Chavez himself would have enhanced.

Guyanese President Donald Ramotar told IPS that during his closed-door half-hour meeting, Maduro made a presentation “offering some very concrete areas in which we could cooperate and Venezuela is ready to work with CARICOM…including on the vexing issue of transport.”

Ramotar said he would describe the talks as “a re-affirmation of the Chavez policy”, adding “that he [Maduro] is continuing that strong solidarity trust President Chavez had made in the past.”

Prime Minister Persad Bissessar said Maduro proposed the re-activation of the Joint CARICOM-Venezuela Commission “based on the long-standing trade and investment agreement which could lead to increased trade, investment and economic and other activities.

“In this regard, several proposals were put forward touching on security, air and sea transportation, energy, a social and cultural plan and developing ties between CARICOM and Mercosur,” the Common Market of the South which was founded in 1991 by Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay, she said.

Ramotar said there was a general consensus that Caracas needed to work with the region given its close proximity.

“I think working together would help us to pool our resources,” he said, telling IPS that regional leaders had welcomed the support for transportation given that Caracas has its own airline and cheaper fuel.

“Those are, of course, things that have not yet been thrashed out, but these are areas I can see where we have great possibility,” Ramotar said, adding that security was also another area for cooperation because “the fight against drugs affects all of us and drugs pass through the region.”

The CARICOM summit here was expected to focus on air and sea transportation, as a bedrock component of the integration movement.

“Transportation is key to the integration process and we have to make sure we get it right this time. If the whole question of integration is going to make any sense we need to address this issue frontally,” Antigua and Barbuda Prime Minister Baldwin Spencer told IPS.

His counterpart from Grenada, Dr. Keith Mitchell, making a return to regional politics after a five-year absence, told IPS, “The fact is that while we are trying to advance the CARICOM Single Market and Economy, we still do not have transportation to effect those changes.”

The CARICOM chair said the leaders had agreed to the re-introduction of the single domestic space (SDS), which expedites regional travel for citizens from member nations. They have also given their full support to a proposal by Haiti to convene a high-level meeting on persons with disabilities and special needs, and on the issue of genocide and slavery reparations.

“We have in my view a very strong case,” said St. Vincent and the Grenadines Prime Minister Dr. Ralph Gonsalves, who has been pushing for reparations from Europe for the slave trade.

U.S. Vice President Joe Biden in Port of Spain, Trinidad on May 28, 2013. Credit: Peter Richards

By Peter Richards
PORT OF SPAIN, Trinidad, May 30 2013 (IPS)

First it was U.S. Vice President Joe Biden, who travelled to Trinidad and Tobago Tuesday to speak with “our friends” in the Caribbean.

And on Friday, China’s newly elected president, Xi Jingping, will arrive in Port of Spain for talks with eight Caribbean Community (CARICOM) leaders that Beijing says will “further increase political trust and consolidate friendship and cooperation with the entire region”.

Biden left here on Tuesday after a 21-hour visit during which time he held “frank and cordial” discussions with leaders of the 15-member CARICOM grouping, a precursor to a meeting with U.S. President Barack Obama.

“I am hoping that the meeting with President Obama will take place this year,” St. Kitts and Nevis Prime Minister Dr. Denzil Douglas told IPS.

“The Caribbean has never downplayed the importance of the United States to its growth and development and I think direct conversations with President Obama will also signal our importance to our big neighbour up north,” said Douglas.

He will not be among those attending the meeting with the Chinese leader as his twin-island federation, despite China’s insistence on a “One China” policy, maintains diplomatic relations with Taiwan, which Beijing regards as a renegade province.

Newly re-elected Grenadian Prime Minister Dr. Keith Mitchell said that in talks with both Biden and Obama, officials will bring up the issue of deporting Caribbean-born criminals back to the region.

“Clearly this is an issue we have to deal with but we have accepted the fact the U.S. government made that decision and we are not going to get that changed,” he told IPS, adding that “Mr Biden wants a serious story to go home with.”

Biden has made it clear that Washington wants to “able to play a part in the overall development of the region” and that the trade investment framework agreement (TIFA) which he signed before his departure should be viewed “as a vehicle that would overcome special specific practical barriers to trade and investment and accommodate those changes as rapidly as possible.

“Our goals are not simply growth but it is growth that reaches everybody, and we spoke today from poverty measures to support for small businesses to greater opportunities for all citizens regardless of their gender and their sexual orientation,” Biden said.

Washington has promised the region assistance in a wide range of areas including security, immigration and renewable energy, as well as dealing with the impacts of climate change.

“There is probably no group of nations better situated to take advantage of renewable energy possibilities than here in the Caribbean,” Biden said.

On the issue of security, Biden said he made it clear to the regional leaders that Washington approaches “this as a shared responsibility” even while acknowledging that the “successful” policies of the past may now be forcing those involved in the illegal drug trade to target the Caribbean.

The United States has spent more than 200 million dollars through the Caribbean Basin Security Initiative (CBSI) launched in 2009 and 30 billion dollars on reducing drug demand.

“We were so successful collectively in the decades of the 80’s and 90’s that the preferred route to get to the United States from South America of cocaine, and some heroin and other products was no longer through the Caribbean but through the Isthmus and Central America,” he said.

“Now because of the significant initiatives we have with our Central American friends, the concern legitimately served by many is that it may move back into the Caribbean and on a greater scale than they exist now.”

The Chinese president, who will also travel to Washington for talks with President Obama on Jun. 7, is hoping that his discussions with the Caribbean leaders will further promote cooperation and inject new vitality into their bilateral ties.

“China always holds that all countries, no matter big or small, rich or poor, strong or weak, are equal members of the international community,” the Chinese Embassy said in a statement ahead of the visit, adding that Beijing would “like to expand our exchange and cooperation in politics, economic, culture, etc, so as to advance bilateral relations in a sound and healthy way”.

Beijing said that its “friendly relations with the Latin America and Caribbean (LAC) region have been growing significantly stronger in the past ten years” and President Xi’s visit comes at “an important time for both China and the LAC region, and even more so for the English-speaking Caribbean Community (CARICOM) region”.

“China-LAC ties are also flourishing multilaterally in the new global dispensation. LAC states can today access new forms of bilateral and multilateral China aid through the recently established Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC), as well as through wider regional economic and financial entities such as the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) and the Caribbean Development Bank (CDB). China is a contributing and non-borrowing member of both institutions.”

Professor Andy Knight, director of the Institute of International Relations at the University of the West Indies (UWI), said that the visits of the two leaders send a strong signal.

“The U.S. better realise that if it ignores the Caribbean and Latin American region, China is prepared to fill the power vacuum right in America’s backyard,” he told a local newspaper.

“What is interesting about these visits is that they are occurring within days of each other. The U.S. can be accused sometimes of neglecting the Caribbean…China, in its quest for energy sources wherever it can find them, is paying attention to Trinidad specifically because of this country’s oil and gas deposits.”

Trinidad and Tobago’s Energy Minister Kevin Ramnarine said that while the United States and China are two of the largest consumers of energy in the world, Biden had indicated that the United States had shale gas reserves for 100 years and was on the way to becoming self-sufficient.

Ramnarine said with 63 percent of methanol, 85 percent of ammonia and 39 percent of outputs from the local refinery going to the U.S. last year, Port of Spain will now have to find new markets and that energy issues will feature prominently in the discussions with president Xi.

Trinidad and Tobago’s Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Dookeran, speaking, with CARICOM Secretary General Irwin La Roque (seated right).

By Peter Richards
PORT OF SPAIN, Trinidad, May 18 2013 (IPS)

Whether by accident or coincidence, recent days have seen a variety of Caribbean leaders and journalists question whether the region is failing to pursue leadership roles within international organisations – and thus losing its voice in global issues like trade, climate change, and peace and security.

“These days, it is difficult to find CARICOM citizens in top positions, except for Dr. Carissa F. Etienne of Dominica who is director general of PAHO [the Pan American Health Organisation]; Albert Ramdin of Suriname, who is assistant secretary general at the OAS [Organisation of American States]; and Judge Patrick Robinson of Jamaica, who is president of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia,” the Jamaica Observer said in an editorial this week.

The paper went on to blame “the complete lack of strategic planning by the political leadership and Caricom Secretariat in positioning our regional citizens for top jobs.”

Earlier in the week, the country’s former prime minister P.J. Patterson, speaking at the launch of the book “Multilateral Diplomacy for Small States” by former Guyanese foreign affairs minister Rudy Insanally, also lamented the fact that few from the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) were occupying high-profile positions outside the region itself.

In defence of the 15-member bloc, Trinidad and Tobago’s Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Dookeran, who chairs the CARICOM Council for Foreign and Community Relations (COFCOR), said the issue was among “strategic matters” discussed during the two-day meeting of Caribbean foreign ministers that ended here Wednesday.

“At the level of Caribbean personalities in international organisations we are conscious of it and we had a long discussion on that and we are devising a process by which we are trying to improve that presence,” he told IPS.

Dookeran, who in his own address to the foreign ministers had also questioned whether “diplomacy in the Caribbean has lost its magic”, said that Caribbean countries need to make “the political statement as necessary in the councils of those bodies that we need to have a higher presence”.

CARICOM Secretary General Irwin La Rocque told IPS that Caribbean countries, despite their seemingly low profile, are still viewed as “prized assets” globally, and points to the presence at the meeting here of delegations from as far away as Japan and New Zealand.

“I am not so sure we have lost our charm, I think it is there. A number of political personalities have expressed an interest in coming to the heads of government meeting in Trinidad in July and I think that in itself speaks volumes,” La Roque said.

He added that there have been recent bilateral discussions with the United Arab Emirates, Turkey and Chile, arguing “the outside world seems to recognise the ability of the CARICOM countries to punch above its weight.

“I don’t think we have lost the charm, I think what we have to do is to be a little certain in terms of harnessing and leveraging our collective voices in the international forum,” he told IPS.

Caribbean diplomacy is expected to benefit from the decision of the Trinidad and Tobago government to fund a diplomatic academy at the University of the West Indies (UWI) that “would provide current and future diplomats, government officials, non-state actors with training and learning facilities on issues and processes that are relevant to the discharge of our diplomacy and the conduct of our foreign relations”.

Dookeran, who has been calling for a “new frontier for Caribbean convergence”, said the academy, which opens in September with an international conference, “will establish a network of cooperation with similar training and learning institutions to benefit from the benefits and offerings from other countries,” and that interest has been shown by countries in North America, Asia, Europe and Latin America.

“We are realising the limitations of being a one-language country,” he conceded. “It will take time to change that…this is part of our British inheritance.”

The CARICOM foreign ministers have also vowed to pursue reforms in the United Nations Security Council to better take into consideration the positions of developing countries.

“Clearly that’s an issue that is very troubling,” Dookeran said, adding that the membership should be “placed on the agenda squarely and frontally at the next [General] Assembly”.

“We have in fact begun to talk with some major countries in the world in order to make sure we have the necessary political clout to make a start,” he said.

The communiqué issued at the end of the meeting here said Japan’s candidature for a 2016-2017 non-permanent seat and reform of the Security Council had been discussed with Minoru Kiuchi, the parliamentary vice-minister for foreign policy, and “welcomed the commitment expressed by Japan to drastically increase assistance” to the region.

Nonetheless, Dookeran insists that small states “should have a political presence in the Security Council”.

“We are not saying in what ways it should be done at this stage, and we are saying that the continent of Africa should definitely be part of that process,” he said. Such changes would be a reflection “of the return to political and moral legitimacy of the body and therefore there is need to establish that so that its views cannot be ignored.

“There is [also] need to have more diplomatic dialogue with international financial institutions” such as the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) so as to get them to change their lending policies to small island developing states (SIDS), he said.

In this vein, the Caribbean is working on developing new strategic partnerships with other SIDS “so that we can improve the strength of the voice of the small economies of the world.”

St. Kitts residents welcome solar streetlights in areas they say have been too dark and prone to crime. Credit: Desmond Brown/IPS

By Desmond Brown
BASSETERRE, St. Kitts, Feb 2 2013 (IPS)

The tiny federation of St. Kitts-Nevis and its larger neighbour to the north, Jamaica, are leading the Caribbean’s search for new ways to become more energy efficient by installing new solar streetlights, a green alternative to traditional ones.

In St. Kitts, the project is a collaborative effort between the government of Denzil Douglas and Taiwan, which have had diplomatic relations for the past 28 years. The Federation of St. Kitts-Nevis is one of a handful of Caribbean Community (CARICOM) countries to have diplomatic relations with Taiwan, as most of the others have diplomatic relations with mainland China.

“During the past year, we have successfully placed solar panels on the roof of government headquarters and set smart LED lights on the Kim Collins Highway and Frigate Bay Road,” the resident Taiwanese ambassador, Miguel Tsao, told IPS. “Both ventures are significant and important. Also these projects were initiated with our joint efforts to tap into the unlimited clean energy source.”

Instead of relying on fossil fuel, Tsao wants to see citizens doing their part to harness renewable energy to help make the vision of a green island a reality. The diplomat added that there are other important initiatives planned for the island, including the establishment of the first-ever solar farm and the second phase of an Agro-Tourism Demonstration Farm early in 2013.

Benefits of solar lights

The solar streetlights were installed by the Taiwanese company Speed Tech Energy. “It’s a unique Cobra design. The lamp pole is solid steel and type and it can resist wind speeds of up to 250 kilometres per hour,” Lucas Chiu, the company’s general manager, told IPS.

Solar panels convert the sunlight into electricity during the day, and the generated electricity is stored in a battery.

Chiu explained that in cloudy or rainy days the batteries will still charge at 15 to 30 percent. Streetlights will function for three nights (for 13 hours each night), even during periods of continuous rainy days.

Orville Liddie, a 29-year-old local resident, told IPS that there were no lights in those areas for several years and that the solar streetlights could not have come at a better time. “To me it’s a benefit to the communities where the lights have been installed because before the lights there were extremely dark spots,” he said.

“I am a driver and I have always been concerned that when you are driving through those areas at night people could jump out into the road and put road blocks or there could be very serious accidents. I was particularly concerned for the bus drivers because criminals could hold them up at those dark spots at knife point or even at gunpoint,” Liddie added.

Nevis, the smaller island in the twin-island federation, is also showing its neighbours in the Organisation of Eastern Caribbean States (OECS) that it is a leader in the area of generating clean and efficient energy and reducing energy costs, in spite of its small geographic and population size.

In 2010, the 13-kilometre-long island with a mere 12,000 residents, launched the first wind farm ever to be commissioned in the OECS with a promise to provide jobs for islanders, a reliable supply of wind energy, cheaper electricity and reduction in surcharge and the use of imported oils.

The island has been lauded by officials of the Bill Clinton Climate Change Initiative for its efforts towards a “Green Nevis”. During a recent visit, a delegation from the Clinton Climate Change Initiative led by Councilor Jan Hartke and Ambassador Paoli Zampolli held discussions with island officials on work that has already been done to move from fossil to alternative energy on Nevis.

“We have been delighted to see how the government has taken the lead and has mobilised the endeavor to bring geothermal to Nevis, and we will help the government with consultation in an effort to make alternative energy a reality on the island,” said Hartke.

He noted that the Bill Clinton Climate Change Initiative aims to bring down the enormous electricity rates in small island states through alternative resources, with the assistance of wind, solar or waste energy.

Jamaica’s efforts

Jamaica is implementing its streetlight energy-saving initiative jointly with the United States-based technology and engineering solutions firm, Green Energy RG LLC.

A government statement said the aim is to significantly reduce the cost to the budget to maintain the country’s approximately 93,000 streetlights, which totals upwards of 2 billion Jamaican dollars per year (more than 2 million U.S. dollars).

On Jan. 8, the first set of solar-powered light emitting diode (LED) fixtures were installed at Osbourne Store, a community in the central parish of Clarendon.

“We hope to be able to proceed to install lights all over Clarendon and then into other parts of Jamaica. We hope that we will be able to complete the programme…by midyear, and then we can evaluate the results and determine where we go from there,” the country’s local government and community development minister, Noel Arscott said.

Arscott said the pilot phase will see some 5,000 LED panels being installed in Clarendon as well as sections of St. Catherine and Kingston and St. Andrew. Additionally, he said the ministry’s offices at Hagley Park Road in the capital Kingston would also be retrofitted with energy saving solutions.

The 30-megawatt Wadadli Power Plant in Antigua opened on September 8, 2011. Credit: Desmond Brown/IPS

By Desmond Brown
BRIDGETOWN, Barbados, Dec 13 2012 (IPS)

With the exception of oil rich Trinidad and Tobago, most, if not all, other Caribbean islands are extremely vulnerable when it comes to the high costs of imported fuels that are easily disrupted by natural disasters and other phenomena.

Barbados, for example, has spent an estimated four million dollars on oil imports in 2011, equal to six percent of its gross domestic product (GDP). This amount has had a direct negative impact on direct production costs and the overall competitiveness of the Barbadian economy.

The island’s prime minister, Freundel Stuart, however, pointed out that “although many small island developing states are energy deficient in conventional energy, limitless potential for renewable energy and energy efficiency resides in our countries”.

Stuart said that the fundamental issue is how small island developing states (SIDS), which have “inherent structural problems and limited resources”, can “convert this renewable energy potential into a tangible product that is accessible, affordable and adaptable”.

Barbados has been actively promoting sustainable energy practices both on the supply side, mainly using renewable energy sources, and on the demand side, encouraging energy efficiency and energy conservation, in an effort to reduce its dependence on fossil fuels, enhance energy security and stability, improve the economy’s competitiveness and achieve greater environmental sustainability.

Barbardos has more than 40,000 solar water heaters that save the country nearly 13 million U.S. dollars every year. “We are using the country’s success in this industry as a platform for renewable energy development,” Stuart said.

The Caribbean Community (CARICOM) observed its second annual CARICOM Energy Week from Nov. 11-17 under the theme of “sustainable energy powering a green economy”. The Energy Week was established in 2011 to provide a platform for increased awareness about energy matters, especially given the critical importance of energy to economic development.

This year, the Community focused on building awareness about energy conservation and efficiency, as well as the development of renewable energy. It also focused on the necessity of a cleaner, greener energy outlook to mitigate the effects of climate change.

Currently, the Caribbean region depends heavily on imported petroleum and petroleum products, to the tune of 9 billion U.S. dollars per year over the last few years.

Stuart’s Antigua counterpart, Prime Minister Baldwin Spencer, told IPS that energy in all its various forms is essential to all forms of economic and social development. Energy Week provided an opportunity to reflect on the uses of energy in Antigua and Barbuda and develop strategies for promoting its efficient and sustainable use.

“As a small island state, Antigua and Barbuda is also among the countries most vulnerable to global climate change resulting from the use of fossil fuels, and therefore must lead by example in promoting sustainable uses of energy resources, including through energy conservation and energy efficiency,” he said.

“Improving energy efficiency is a critical element of remaining competitive in today’s global economy. With the increasingly high international prices for fuel, we have to be innovative and forward thinking in our efforts to implement energy efficiency measures that can reduce our costs, minimise our environmental footprint and enhance our attractiveness as a ‘green’ destination.”

Spencer said that some resorts in the highly competitive tourism industry, as well as other businesses, are already installing solar panels, waste water management systems, and other measures to save energy.

In its effort to promote a green economy, the Antiguan government recently announced an electricity interconnection policy for renewable energy. The initiative will allow accredited private producers of renewable energy, such as wind and solar power, to connect to the Antigua Public Utilities Authority. The Authority will then be able to reduce the amount of electricity it generates using imported petroleum.

It will also allow “the private consumer to generate an early return on his investment and lead ultimately to mitigating the price for electricity to the consumer and to the economy as a whole”, Spencer said. “All of us are faced with the increasing costs associated with energy. While there is little that we can do about the price of energy, we all can take measures to increase the efficiency with which we use that energy, thereby getting more for our dollar.”

As governments devise plans and programmes to address the global economic crisis, the transition to sustainable energy presents a unique opportunity for all to make their contribution to climate change by powering a green economy.

“It is a huge task – but an achievable one – If we move forward together with one purpose,” Spencer said.

Diane Black-Layne, the chief environmental officer of the environmental division in the government of Antigua and Barbuda, agreed that implementing 100 percent renewable technology in Antigua and Barbuda would result in a significant reduction in energy bills.

“We can use that money that we are paying for our energy bills now and develop the economy, put it into schools; put it into getting us ready for the changes in the climate and things like that,” she told IPS.

“Why didn’t we make the transition to renewables all along? We did not make the changes because nobody wants to give up oil; nobody wants to give up the existing way of doing things.”