News Americas, NEW YORK, NY, Fri. May 31, 2019: The government of Canada this week launched a $20 million (CAD), Canada Caribbean Resilience Facility initiative to help Caribbean countries better prepare for and respond to natural disasters.
The Facility comes some two years after the devastating 2017 Atlantic hurricane season. At the time, Canada pledged $100 million (CAD) to support reconstruction and climate resilience efforts in the Caribbean region over the next five years during the UN-CARICOM High-Level Pledging Conference in November 2017.
The Caribbean Resilience Facility will benefit nine eligible Official Development Assistance (ODA) countries: Antigua & Barbuda, Belize, Dominica, Grenada, Guyana, Jamaica, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent & the Grenadines, and Suriname.
The facility, in partnership with the World Bank and the Global Facility for Disaster Reduction and Recovery (GFDRR), will help countries to strengthen response, recovery, and financial management systems so that governments can be better prepared to respond to and rebuild after disasters, and effectively use emergency funding for post-disaster recovery activities.
It will also support capacity building to accelerate project implementation and develop public financial management systems to respond in case of disasters, with a focus on developing plans and training programs that incorporate gender considerations.
On Wednesday,Marie Legault, High Commissioner of Canada to Barbados and the OECS said the new “initiative is being undertaken with Canada’s Caribbean support as a direct response to the lessons learned following the devastating hurricanes in the Caribbean in 2017 that have impacted our neighbouring countries so severely.”
