By Tajeram Mohabir
PRESIDENT Bharrat Jagdeo has announced that the country’s low carbon development strategy, unveiled on Monday, calls for US$1 billion to address long term climate adaptation requirements.

Speaking at Guyana International Conference Centre (GICC), Greater Georgetown, he said the plan entails a portfolio of urgent, near term investment in the highest priority areas.

Mr. Jagdeo said these include maintenance and reinforcement of the seawalls, repairs to the conservancies and support for switching to flood resistant crops.

One part of the documented approach addresses challenges in Guyana, with the aim of building better resilience into the economy, by upgrading defences against climate change induced flooding, he said.

President Jagdeo said 39 per cent of Guyanese and 43 per cent of the country’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP) are in regions exposed to significant flooding risk.

Yet the drainage and irrigation (D&I) infrastructure is not up to dealing with the changing weather patterns being experienced today, he noted.

According to him:“We are still working to establish the climate change adaptation needs of the hinterland regions but these are likely to include empoldering communities and building new river defences, as well as protecting Guyana’s people and productive land.”

Flooding
The Head of State explained that investing will enable Guyana to reduce the equivalent of 10 per cent of the GDP, which could accrue on average each year, without the damage caused by flooding.

President Jagdeo also said his government is proud of its record in working with Amerindian people to title and demarcate their lands and, over the past decade, the amount of land under Amerindian ownership has grown from about six per cent of Guyana to about 14 per cent today.

He said, currently, 96 village communities, including satellite villages, have titles to their lands; eight have had their lands extended and another nine have made similar requests.

President Jagdeo said those requests are being processed by the Ministry of Amerindian Affairs and individual communities in line with the process set out in the Amerindian Act which allows communities to request titled lands.

“Few countries in the region or globally have such a track record. But there is still more work to do – nine villages are now awaiting titling,” he asserted.

“This is very costly work and I am hopeful that, if REDD and other forest payments materialise, then we will have the resources to complete this work more quickly than otherwise would have been the case. And then these communities will also be able to decide whether and how to opt in to the national forest protection scheme.

“Over the coming thee months, consultations will take place to discuss how this might happen but there will be no deadline imposed as to when forest communities choose to opt in to the overall framework,” Mr. Jagdeo related.

He said, in the next three months, a series of consultations will be held, mainly where Amerindians reside in Regions One (Barima/Waini), Seven (Cuyuni/Mazaruni), Eight (Potaro/ Siparuni), Nine (Upper Takutu/Upper Essequibo) and 10 (Upper Demerara/ Berbice) and a national meeting will also be facilitated, to bring together all elected leaders of the Amerindian peoples.