CCORAL/Dominicans Train for a Changing Climate

               

 

Contact: Jose Sanchez                                                          FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

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Dominicans Train for a Changing Climate 

 An officer from the Agriculture Division and other technical and administrative professionals from various ministries  and organizations in Dominica were recently engaged in a training exercise in the application of the Caribbean’s newest climate risk management tool.  Uniquely developed for the Caribbean, CCORAL (pronounced ‘sea-coral’) is an online support system for climate-resilient decision-making.  It provides users a platform for identifying appropriate responses to the impacts of short and long term climate conditions by applying a risk management approach to development planning.  

 

The training workshop targeted select key government, private sector and NGO agencies/institutions as part of a national capacity-building exercise aimed at inculcating a risk management ethos in decision-making. One of the risks associated with climate change is harsh weather conditions and ironically, the training session had to be aborted due to the passage Tropical Storm Erika. The well-documented impacts of the storm are an unfortunate reminder of the increasing vulnerabilities of small islands like Dominica to the varying climate conditions and events that are rapidly becoming a very real threat to the sustainable development of these small economies.  The region has been beset by droughts, extreme rainfall events, tropical cyclones and other extreme events in recent times that continue to pose increasing challenges for governments. Training in the application of the tool was initially started from August 24-26th and recently resumed and successfully conducted from the 10th-12th of November, 2015.

 

The workshop was opened by Parliamentary Secretary in the Ministry of Health and Environment, Hon. Ivor Stephenson, who recognized climate change as a “serious threat to the country’s development” emphasizing that “climate change as a cross-cutting concern must be treated in a holistic manner.”  Hon. Stephenson also pointed to several actions that the government of Dominica has embarked on to reduce the threat of climate change such as the development of the Low Carbon Development Strategy (LCDS) and the Disaster Reduction Vulnerability Project (DVRP). Hon. Minister of Kalinago Affairs, Cassius Darroux who paid a brief visit to the workshop reiterated his government’s support for such initiatives and congratulated the 5Cs for its support for the development of a Photo voltaic (PV) farm for the Kalinago Territories. Participants remarked that the workshop was “well organized and relevant, easy to apply content and very practical to current local circumstances”.

 

Launched in 2013, CCORAL is a direct product of decisions taken by CARICOM Heads of Government in their recognition of the impacts of climate change on national and regional development.  The Caribbean Community Climate Change Centre (5Cs), which administers the application of the tool, has so far trained 14 CARICOM States in its use.  This is just one of the many activities implemented by the 5Cs that are geared towards building national and regional resilience to the impacts of the short and long term effects of climate change. Funding for the Dominica CCORAL training exercise was provided by the British Government through its UK AID programme.

 

Participants are expected to continue with the capacity building exercise by evaluating a nationally-relevant developmental issue, not only to enhance their competence in the application of the tool itself, but also to inform senior decision makers of the opportunities to building a community of practice in embedding climate risk management in decision-making. A presentation on the findings is expected to be made to senior policy and decision makers in Government on completion of these evaluation exercises.

 

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The Caribbean Community Climate Change Centre (5Cs), is charged with the coordination of the regional approach to addressing the impacts of Climate Change as well as the resilience building efforts of the fifteen (15) CARICOM Member States’ since 2005.  The Centre is the key node for information on climate change issues maintaining the most extensive repository of information and data on climate change specific to the region.  The Centre is recognized by the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, the United Nations Environment Programme, and other international agencies as the focal point for climate change issues in the Caribbean. The Centre is also a United Nations Institute for Training and Research recognised Centre of Excellence, one of an elite few. Learn more about how we’re working to make the Caribbean more climate resilient by perusing The Implementation Plan to the Regional Framework for Achieving Development Resilient to Climate Change.  These documents are all available on the Centre’s website www.caribbeanclimate.bz.

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