Saturday, July 28, 2012

Jamaica will create a climate change department

Jamaica Information Service: Minister of Water, Land, Environment and Climate Change, Hon. Robert Pickersgill, has given the assurance that the proposed Climate Change Department will be fully implemented by the end of the year.

Speaking in the House of Representatives on Tuesday (July 24) during his contribution to the 2012/13 Sectoral Debate, Mr. Pickersgill said the department will help to drive coordination and management of Jamaica’s climate change efforts.

He informed that a draft report for the establishment of the entity has been completed and submitted, with the assistance of two international consultants from the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP). In the meantime, Mr. Pickersgill noted that the Ministry has implemented a number of initiatives and projects geared towards adaptation to climate variability and change.

Among these are the Climate Change Adaptation and Disaster Risk Reduction Project, which is funded by the European Union and the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP). "This project has gained significant ground in fulfilling its objectives to strengthen Jamaica’s adaptive capacity and contribute to sustainable development,” he informed.

...Additionally, he noted that the Ministry is working towards increasing the resilience of the country’s coastal eco-systems to climate change impacts through a number of activities....

Mangrove stand on the Black River in Jamaica, shot by Stufffreak, Wikimedia Commons, under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license

No comments: