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LCDS shaping global initiatives for climate change adaption and mitigation
Shyam Nokta, Adviser to the President and Head of the Office of Climate Change, reflecting on the dynamics of climate change and the LCDS has stated “As the world moves towards embracing green growth and low carbon economies, the experience of Guyana with the LCDS is increasingly being called upon to help shape initiatives within our region and further afield.
“At the recently concluded Rio+20 C o n f e r e n c e on Sustainable Development, where one of the themes was ‘Green economy in the context of sustainable development and poverty eradication’ Guyana’s LCDS was recognized as one of the working examples.”
He continued “Where we are today is not on account of a vision and a strategy alone. It is due to hard work, to staying the course, and to thepartnerships we have established, both locally and internationally.
“Three and a half years ago, former President Jagdeo spoke of his belief that the people of Guyana might be willing to work with international partners to see how we could deploy our forests in the global fight against climate change. We are now just two-and-a-half years past the coming on board of the first partner – the Kingdom of Norway, and already the project implementation phase is at hand. Our partnership with Norway has incredibly high ambitions to create a model for the world on how we can align national development and (simultaneously) combating climate change.”
Facing challenges and overcoming derailment attempts by detractors
Nokta went on to speak to the many challenges facing the strategy. One would recall the sustained and vehement opposition by the joint opposition and their supporters – such as Janet Bulkan, Christopher Ram, Khemraj Ramjattan, et al, who even went so far as to write to the Kingdom of Norway to dissuade that country from disbursing funds much needed for adaptation and mitigation of the depredations wrought on this country by the climate change phenomenon, despite the fact that our country had earned the money.
However, Norway rejected thosearguments, and Guyana was paid the second tranche of US$40million for the climate services our forests had delivered.
Nokta elucidated, “We are now in Year 3 of 5, and the issues of disbursing money intospecific projects have been occupying our attention. The moneywhich Guyana has earned has been deposited into the GRIF -US$70 million of the total partnership projection of US$250 million.”
The opportunistic, unpatriotic detractors failed in their attempts to derail the LCDS and Guyana has received two payments in tranches of US$30 million and $US$40 million – a sum total of US$70, which is supporting time implementation of projects under the LCDS, beginning with the Amerindian Development Fund, which is meant to develop hinterland communities in areas identified by Guyana’s indigenous peoples themselves, as Government has recognised that these Amerindian communities best know their own needs.
According to Nokta, in the first year of the partnership, Guyana addressed challengesassociated with the basics: issues such as getting accurate,scientifically -valid data on the size of our forests and deforestationrates, which is a feat achieved by just a few countries. “But,” he said, “we addressed
these challenges and today Guyana is implementing one ofthe world’s most advanced forest monitoring, reporting andverification (MRV) systems.”
He continued: “In the first year of the partnership we earned US$30 milliondollars. In the second year, the challenge was about setting up the mechanisms into which Norway’s payments would bemade: The deposit is invested by the World Bank on our behalf, to earn interest for our country until such time as we begin todraw down these funds. Before we established the GRIF, a national-scale modelfor payment for carbon services had never been implementedanywhere in the world.”
Governments of Norway and Guyana will continue to stay the course
.Nokta emphasized that this country’s work on the LCDS and the Guyana/Norway partnership
“…continues to deepen in quality and broaden in scope.” He said, “We fixed thechallenges of Year 1 and 2, we are getting there on the Challengesof Year 3. We are currently undergoing theindependentverification processes which will pave the way for us to receivepayment for Year 3 in the coming months.
“And as the money flow increases, and the partnership continues,the Governments of Guyana and Norway will continue tostay the course.”
Their Excellencies, President Donald Ramotar and Norwegian PrimeMinister Stoltenberg, when they met in June in Rio de Janeiro, re-affirmed the mutual resolve of thetwo countries.
Nokta verified that Guyana has now reached the project implementation stage and the first LCDS project to be implemented will support Amerindian Development. “In thisregard,” he affirmed, “Amerindian villages across Guyana have invested timeand energy in preparing a total of 180 Community DevelopmentPlans.”
The historic Agreementwith the UNDP,facilitating the establishment of the Development Fund, valued at US $6 million, was recently signed, which now allows for an initial 360 Million Dollars to be madeavailable for the execution of 15% of projects identified under theCDPs, in what is described as the initiation phase.
One of the PPP/C administration’s main empowerment planks for its citizens – across all the divides, is the distribution of lands to enable wealth-creation; so another vital area of support to Amerindians is theland titling and demarcation process, which will now be optimized from the funds Guyana has earned.
Nokta states: “Guyana has one of the best track records in the world on titlingand giving property rights to Amerindians. To date, 96 titles havebeen granted, which represents approximately 13% of Guyana’sland area and, as outlined in the LCDS, government will continueto work to progress titling, demarcation and extension requests.This too is expected to commence shortly through collaborationwith the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP).”
The Opt-in Mechanism
Under the Guyana-Norway partnership, only State Forests have been included in themodel. The Opt-In Mechanism presents an opportunity for thosetitled villages with forests to include their forests into the modeland, in so doing, receive payments based on performance. This does not mean that if villages choose not to Opt-In they willnot get benefits under the LCDS. The principle of free, prior andinformed consent will apply to the Mechanism.
Nokta reiterated “Indeed we have come a far way in a relatively short period of
Time, and the vision we (as adumbrated by Dr. Bharrat Jagdeo during the launching ceremony of the LCDS) set out three and a half years ago remainsstrong.
“ From the inception we recognized we were being boldand innovative and that there would be challenges along the way.Our work is helping to influence and shape the internationalframework on climate change and an agreement on REDD+. Thisputs Guyana out front, and shows that we are capable of leading as a country and as a Government.”
Guyana a global leader
Having inherited a devastated nation and a bankrupt economy in 1992, the fledgling PPP/C administration was forced to strategise and formulate innovative ways to reduce the crippling debt burden, riding this nation’s soul like the legendary albatross, aswell as to devise means of income generation that would enable the rebuilding and regrowth process that would once more generate hope in the dehumanized working-class people of this nation, as well as generate enough confidence in a demoralised private sector that would encourage entrepreneurs – both local and foreign, to partner with government and become an engine of growth in the country’s development processes.
All the while they had to contend with a destructive opposition collective that continually strategise to pull this country and its people down in tandem with the PPP/C administration’s attempts to develop this country to achieve its optimum potential for progress and prosperity.
The Government has achieved its objectives brilliantly, with a stabilization of macro-economic fundamentals and sustained economic growth, with real social development; even while global economies were collapsing like decks of cards and the negative fallout could not help but be felt by developing countries like Guyana.
And one of the pillars on which rests the re-instituted upward trajectory in growth indices in Guyana’s development landscape is the visionary LCDS.
In his brilliant speech during the launching ceremony of the LCDS, Dr. Bharrat Jagdeo stated, inter alia: At the core of the (national) consultation is a key question: as our country embarks on a second generation of economic reform and infrastructural development, how can we do this in a manner which aligns our national development needs with the global need to combat climate change?
“This question is grounded in the fact that too many people around the world continue to see combating climate change and promoting national development as conflicting objectives. The draft Low- Carbon Development Strategy, which you will receive today, lays out the key elements of how we might change this paradigm in Guyana, and how we can provide a model for rainforest countries across the globe.” That he has done so is now history, for which he was awarded the conferral of the title “Champion of the Earth”, by UNEP, among a multiplicity of other national and international honours, I may add, much to the chagrin of his power-hungry and envious local detractors..
Merely a few years prior Guyana was best known on the world map – infamous for the Jonestown massacre. Today, through the visionaryleaders of the PPP, with Dr. Cheddi Jagan’s “New Global Human Order”, Dr. Bharrat Jagdeo’s LCDS, among a multiplicity of visionary initiatives that have catapulted Guyana’s leaders in world ranks and catalysed this nation’s image as a global leader in many considerations integral to human existence on Planet Earth, little Guyana, barely discernible on the world map, has become a towering nation on the landscape of universal socio-economics dynamics
