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CLIMATE
CHANGE, SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT OF CARIBBEAN SEA
Date Posted: October 23, 2008.
(Department of Public Information, United Nations, New York)
- Countries of the Caribbean region were headed for
“hard and difficult times” unless they took steps, with the
cooperation and support of the international community, to
forestall the impending adverse effects of climate change,
representatives of the Association of Caribbean States told
correspondents at a Headquarters press conference today.
The Caribbean region was heavily dependent on tourism and
fisheries industries -- both severely vulnerable to global
warming and weather anomalies, according to the
Association’s delegation, which painted a dire picture of
the damage that could be wrought by changes in sea surface
temperatures and sea levels, which could, among others,
result in flooding and erosion in low-lying coastal areas.
The Association’s members have, this week, been meeting in
New York to raise awareness among United Nations Member
States of a number of resolutions the Association planned
shortly to put before the General Assembly’s Second
Committee (Economic and Financial), including one that had
been around for a few years seeking to have the Caribbean
Sea area designated as a special area within the context of
sustainable development.
John Agard, one of the Nobel Prize-winning scientists on the
United Nations-backed Intergovernmental Panel on Climate
Change (IPCC), told reporters that the Caribbean was already
recording enormous amounts of rain, and available scientific
evidence revealed the increased intensity of hurricanes.
Rising temperatures were causing hurricanes to last longer,
become stronger and more destructive. Projections for the
future were that the frequency of hurricanes and tropical
storms was likely to increase, rather than diminish, he
added.
Current Chair of the Association’s Caribbean Sea Commission,
Donville Innis, said the Commission had put a lot of time
and effort in the resolution on declaring the Caribbean Sea
a special area for sustainable development, and considered
the work extremely important to the 25 nations that formed
the Association -- the islands in the Caribbean and the
Central American states.
Recognizing the Caribbean Sea provided not only a great
natural resource in terms of fishing, and given the
importance of tourism to the economies of the Caribbean and
Central America, the Association’s members felt duty-bound
to protect that asset, not only for the present generation,
for many generations in the future. Mr. Innis, who is also
the Minister of State in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs,
Foreign Trade and International Business of Barbados, added
that the Caribbean Sea was also one of the most heavily
trafficked waterways, and there was need to ensure there was
better management of that resource from all aspects.
He said the Association’s delegation had, this time around,
also “zeroed in” on climate change and its impact on the
region, by including in its delegation to the Second
Committee a panel of technical experts who had been at the
forefront of research on ecosystems in the Caribbean and
Central American region. The panel had come up with ample
evidence of the damage that was currently being done and the
potential harm to the ecosystem.
While in New York, the Association’s members had held a
series of meetings with various United Nations partners,
including with both Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and
Assembly President Miguel d’Escoto Brockmann. The delegation
was appreciative of the support of both those officials, and
looked forward to having its resolution tabled and dealt
with.
He said the team had been especially “warmed” by
Secretary-General Ban’s commitment to deal with issues
involving climate change, as well as the natural
environment. They expected that under his stewardship, the
United Nations and its associated bodies would certainly
ensure that the issue was at the forefront and dealt with in
an expeditious and judicious manner. The group was grateful
too for the Secretary-General’s commitment to, and
recognition of, the special role of small island developing
states within the global arena, and expected that the issue
of having the Caribbean Sea designated as a special area
would be dealt with expeditiously at the United Nations.
Also speaking at the press conference, Luis Fernando Andrade
Falla, Secretary-General of the Association of Caribbean
States, said the delegation was in New York because of the
seriousness of the case it planned to take to the Assembly.
Indeed, it was a “scientific case; not a political case”,
explaining that the Association’s 25 member countries were
seriously vulnerable to climate change.
For example, this year’s hurricane season was one of the
worst on record, causing damage and impacting most countries
in the greater Caribbean region, from the smallest islands
to the largest countries. In particular, he underlined the
dramatic situations of Haiti, Cuba, Jamaica and the
Dominican Republic in the wake of successive tropical
storms, although every single country in Central America was
affected.
He said that scientists were making the case for
strengthened cooperation in projecting the intensity,
frequency and impact of climate change. Such cooperation
needed to go beyond political or ideological positions.
“This goes beyond our differences in the region; historical,
cultural or language. It’s an opportunity to strengthen our
cooperation with the world community,” he said.
The Association’s team expected to have its “toughest
discussions” today, when it planned to wrap up the
delegation’s time in New York in separate bilateral meetings
with United States officials and representatives of the
European Union. The Association intended to “strongly
present our case”, which already had the strong support of
the Group of 77 developing countries and China, and the
Non-Aligned Movement, among other negotiating blocs.
For his part, Mr. Agard observed that although it had often
been emphasized that the region was particularly dependent
on natural resources in connection with the livelihoods of
the people, not many people had an appreciation of just how
dependent it was. To that end, he highlighted the impacts of
climate change on Caribbean tourism, which was, of course,
highly dependent on the state of the environment.
As tourism was the region’s largest employer, anything that
affected the quality of the environment, therefore, had a
direct link to the wellbeing of the people, their jobs and
incomes. “Fear of hurricanes and their increasing frequency
and intensity keep tourists away. The fact that it is
getting warmer in some cold places means that they’re less
inclined to travel,” he said. Other industries, especially
fisheries, had also been adversely impacted, thereby
affecting the employment and livelihoods of hundreds of
thousands of people.
A correspondent asked if the speakers’ failure to make any
reference to or mention of the shipment of nuclear waste
through the Caribbean was “a tactical move or a de-emphasis”
of the issue, as it had been at one stage at the pinnacle of
the whole debate about the preservation of the Caribbean
Sea. Mr. Falla denied the matter was deliberately set aside,
explaining that the issue remained a concern but was being
approached in a manner that would involve all the parties,
including all the major Powers. The stakeholders were part
of the region, and in the case of France, for instance, that
country was an associate member of the Association.
He added that the intention was not to “force a new legal
framework”, as there was already regulation in place.
Further, the purpose of the delegation’s mission was not to
set aside any such concerns, but rather to highlight those
areas where cooperation was most urgently needed. The
climate change issue was so serious, that if major Powers
were not involved at all levels –- backing the resolution in
the Assembly, or providing support and cooperation on the
ground -- the Association’s efforts were bound to fail.
On the same subject, Mr. Agard noted that while the issue of
transhipment of nuclear waste had been a long-standing
concern in the region, studies had shown that the
“scientific truth of the matter” was that there was “a very
remote possibility” of a container breach or spillage in the
region’s waterways. Additionally, the region relied on the
guidance and regulations on the matter set out by the
International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).
Further clarifying the point, Christopher Hackett, Permanent
Representative of Barbados and moderator of the press
conference, explained that while scientists indicated the
level of the risk to be somewhat low, that did not mean the
matter had been taken off the table. Rather, from the
diplomatic point of view, the fact that the risk existed at
all made it necessary to discuss the matter in collaboration
with some of the major Powers involved in such shipments.
