Financing resilience in Caribbean’s hurricane zone
UNITED NATIONS: As a new hurricane season approaches in the Caribbean, I attended last week’s dialogue focused on “Financing Resilience in SIDS” held in Antigua and Barbuda and sponsored by the host government and Belgium.
The gathering sought to identify the main risks facing Small Island Developing States ( SIDS), especially in terms of financing and innovative solutions to the countries’ challenges.
These vastly different SIDS have much in common. There was a clear recognition that the splendour of their beauty, wealth of their culture and vibrancy of their people mask a deep vulnerability to both natural disasters and economic shocks, which are further exacerbated by climate change.
This is true for Caribbean countries and beyond. In addition to the Caribbean, participants at the event last week also included representatives from Africa, Indian Ocean and the Pacific, from their Permanent Missions to the UN.
The hurricanes of last September 2017 that devastated our host, Antigua and Barbuda, and other Caribbean countries provided a compelling testimonial to this “new normal”. Dominica lost 226 per cent of its GDP and a generation of development gains in a matter of hours with the passage of Hurricane Maria.
In our host country, the island of Barbuda endured a similar fate just 10 days earlier after Hurricane Irma left a path of destruction. The story is very much the same in other SIDS, such as Vanuatu and Fiji, which suffered massive losses from Cyclones Pam and Winston in 2015 and 2016 respectively.
Notwithstanding the compelling narrative of adverse weather events, there are also other challenges, which hamper the ability to build resilient Small Island Developing States.
As a UNDP presenter, I emphasised that resilience in the context of SIDS should be holistic and not exclusively associated with hurricanes and natural disasters.
The outcome document, “The St John’s Call for Action” clearly recognized that building resilience in the Caribbean is about managing the risks associated with natural disasters, but this entails much more than hurricanes, as our Human Development Report for the Caribbean also stressed. One big challenge is accessing finance. SIDS are largely classified as middle or highincome countries with limited access to concessional financing and Overseas Development Assistance (ODA).
This is compounded by high levels of debt in places such as the Caribbean, which is one of the world’s most highly indebted regions. Indeed, its debt burden stands at an estimated US$ 52 billion with a debt to GDP ratio of more than 70 per cent. In some countries, debt levels are more than 100 percent of GDP.
At the same time, due to the small geographical and population size, SIDS invariably have a narrow tax base, limiting the ability to mobilise resources domestically.
Mindful of these constraints, the St John’s Call to Action made some specific recommendations.
The role and importance of innovation was placed at the forefront on the way forward. Peter Thomson, the UN’s Special Envoy for Oceans made a compelling case for the blue economy— or boosting sustainable use of the ocean’s resources for gains in the social, economic and environmental realms— as a viable policy option.