http://www.jamaicaobserver.com/environment/AFB-to-host-regional-climate-change-workshop_8702397

LATIN America and the Caribbean's ability to adapt to the devastating impacts of climate change is expected to improve with the hosting of a major capacity-building workshop in the region this year.

The workshop, one of three or four being hosted by the Adaptation Fund Board (AFB), is to help enhance the ability of national implementing entities in the region to write strong proposals and carry out activities geared at reducing climate change impacts.
This was disclosed by the Group of Latin America and the Caribbean representative on the AFB, Jeffrey Spooner, who last month attended the 13th meeting of the board in Bonn, Germany.
"The workshop in Latin America and the Caribbean is one of the first of the series of regional workshops that are to be held. The decision to host the workshops came out of the climate change meeting in Cancún , Mexico in December 2010," he said.
Spooner said Jamaica is among the countries in a group that has been tasked with planning and carrying out the workshops.
"Another workshop is to be held in Asia with the possibility of a fourth one in the South Pacific, but the dates for those two have not been set yet," he said.
According to Spooner, the workshops are a direct response to challenges faced by small island developing states in meeting the requirements to qualify for grants from the Adaptation Fund.
"The board is being proactive in trying to assist the direct access modality (to the fund) as much as we can. With the direct access modality, countries can access grants from the funds directly if the chosen national implementing entities are able to meet certain requirements," said the man, who is also one of Jamaica's senior climate negotiators. "We know the challenges that some countries face in having their national entities accredited."
Small island developing states, including the Caribbean, are expected to be severely affected by the impacts of climate change, which include warming sea surface temperatures that could disrupt coastal livelihoods and more extreme weather events, such as hurricanes and droughts.
One hundred and seventy eight developing countries worldwide can receive grants from the Adaptation Fund. So far, Jamaica is only one of three countries worldwide that have in place an accredited national implementing entity — the Planning Institute of Jamaica. The other countries are Senegal and Uruguay.
However, of the three, Jamaica is the only country that has not yet submitted a project for consideration by the AFB, which is currently reviewing a concept received from Uruguay at the Germany meeting. Senegal has already received their first allocation and have started their project.
However, Indi Mclymont-Lafayette, regional director for media and environment at Panos Caribbean and a member of the Vision 2030 Hazard Risk Reduction and Adaptation to Climate Change Working Group in Jamaica, said the island is making progress.
"The 2030 thematic working group has completed the first draft of a concept which is being revised by the committee and will be submitted to the AFB very shortly," said the woman, who was also present at the March meeting of the AFB.
She noted that Panos Caribbean had attended the meeting on the invitation of Germanwatch — an independent non-governmental organisation that focuses on international issues such as trade, environment and the relationship between developed and developing countries — which wants Panos to sign up to facilitate civil society participation in the Adaption Fund's activities in Jamaica.
"Panos is still working to finalise a two-year contract with Germanwatch, outlining specific activities to be done," said Mclymont-Lafayette.
The Adaptation Fund was established to finance concrete adaptation projects and programmes in developing countries that are parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change and the Kyoto Protocol. The Fund is financed with two per cent of carbon credits issued for projects under the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) and other sources of funding.