UK and Caribbean Sign MOU to Enhance Climate Resilience

The United Kingdom is moving to increase access to climate financing in the Caribbean, aimed at improving the region’s resiliency to climate change. Today, the UK’s Minister for the Americas and the Caribbean, David Rutley, signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the Caribbean Community Climate Change Centre (CCCCC) under the Small Island Developing States Capacity and Resilience Programme. The effort will significantly impact countries in the region, including Belize, Dominica, Grenada, Guyana, Jamaica, St. Lucia, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, and Suriname. Rutley explained that the program will aim to build capacity, foster collaboration, and use climate data to inform decision-making. 

David Rutley, UK Minister – Americas and the Caribbean: “We’ve been talking over the last year a lot about what we can do to help Belize and the Caribbean more widely on tackling climate change and there is some amazing work that’s going on. But one of the key asks across the Caribbean and certainly from me speaking with the Foreign Minister is about access to climate finance and the new memorandum of understanding that we’ve signed today with the 5Cs, part of CARICOM’s infrastructure, will make it easier for us to provide support in enabling countries, Belize and others across the Caribbean, to access funding and to build capacity so that going forward the countries are able to do that more effectively. There’s a real art to filling out these forms and bidding requests and we want to make sure that the Caribbean is well placed and Belize particularly to enable them to get access to enable you to get access to that financing. There will be support there but there will be support more widely to help build capacity to complete the necessary forms and make the engagement to get access to that finance. So we’ll make sure that support is available, but it fits in a much wider agenda of what we’re trying to do to help Belize and the Caribbean more widely. I’m particularly optimistic about the Biodiverse Landscape Fund that we’re supporting with Belize and three other Central American countries that helps with the green conservation. But obviously there’s fantastic work going on with the Oceans Country Partnership Program in blue conservation as well, marine conservation. So this is what we just signed today is important, but it’s just one element of a much wider program of activity that we’re doing together to unlock finance but also expertise to tackle climate change.”