sustainable development 20 years on from the ... - José Eli da Veiga

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In addition, Caribbean countries are vulnerable to natural disasters that threaten their biodiversity.
Severe storms often have a disproportionately higher impact on the biodiversity of small islands in
comparison with other regions or countries due to smaller land mass and smaller habitats (Wong and
others, <strong>20</strong>05). Climate change effects on oceans will also likely result in bleaching and possible
destruction of coral reefs, which are crucial to biodiversity in the Caribbean and are a unique tourist
attraction (UNDP, <strong>20</strong>10). In the Caribbean, many forests were cleared in the past for sugar and banana
plantations, and any remaining forests now tend to be secondary forests that lack the rich biodiversity of
old-growth forests. As a result, bird species and marine mammals are becoming increasingly endangered.
4. United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification
All the Caribbean countries have signed and/or ratified the United Nations Convention to Combat
Desertification. The achievements of Caribbean SIDS in implementing the Convention have been
documented in four national communications submitted to the Convention secretariat since <strong>20</strong>00. 9
Key areas of progress include the following:
(i) National action programmes under the Convention have been submitted by 10 Caribbean
SIDS, 10 and the remaining countries have reported their programmes to be in preparation.
(ii) Participatory processes as part of the implementation of the Convention are being
encouraged by all parties to the Convention and are considered an important component of
success. Most SIDS have organized national-level meetings to validate their reports and
some countries of the Organization of Eastern Caribbean States (OECS) have also conducted
awareness campaigns in their processes for defining national action programme priorities
(United Nations, <strong>20</strong>02).
(iii) Legislative and institutional frameworks or arrangements have progressed in three areas:
(a) formulation of legislation in areas related to desertification (forest and water resources);
(b) legal reforms aimed at facilitating coherent policies and regulations to combat
desertification and drought; and (c) laws and regulations on the use of natural resources and
their enforcement (United Nations, <strong>20</strong>02). For example, the St. George’s Declaration of
Principles for Environmental Sustainability in the OECS helped promote legal and
institutional reforms to harmonize and strengthen the environmental sector. Since <strong>20</strong>01 the
Dominican Republic has introduced legal and institutional frameworks stipulating
environmental policies on land, water, biological and human resources along its border with
Haiti through the Hispaniola Subregional Action Programme. In addition, most countries
have appointed focal points and have elected a national coordinating body to guide the
implementation of the Convention (United Nations, <strong>20</strong>02).
(iv) Linkages and synergies with other conventions and national <strong>development</strong> strategies have
been explored by Caribbean SIDS. An important initiative has been the identification of
national-level synergies between government agencies and departments on land degradation
9
10
National Communications under the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification [online]
http://www.unccd.int/cop/reports/menn.php.
Antigua and Barbuda, Bahamas, Barbados, Cuba, Dominica, Dominican Republic, Grenada, Guyana, Jamaica
and Saint Kitts and Nevis.