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Contact:
John Emmanuel
Thursday, July 21, 2005 - A call has been sounded here for issues
surrounding global climate change and its impacts on small island developing
states of the Caribbean to be addressed with urgency. The latest call came
Thursday, as the Ministry of Physical Development, Environment and Housing
staged a one-day symposium on Climate Change and Food Production at the Cara
Suites hotel in La Pansee.
Organized in collaboration with the Inter-American Institute for Co-operation in
Agriculture (IICA) and several stakeholder groups, Thursday’s exercise sought to
draw on the experiences of the past half century, as exemplified in the last two
hurricane seasons, which resulted in increased loss of life and significant
damages.
IICA’s representative Una-May Gordon said the challenges of climate change pose
a real threat for the region’s ability to meet its goal of food security. In
this regard she said efforts must be intensified at repositioning the
agricultural industries of the region, if they are to survive in the 21st
century.
According to Gordon, “In the past, progress in agricultural development has
often resulted in environmental degradation, polluted water supplies, degraded
soils, loss of biodiversity and wild life habitat and displacement of rural
peoples.”
Over the next 30-50 years, it is believed that world population will more than
double.
“The challenge to agriculture then will be to meet the food needs of this vastly
increased population on a reduced acreage of farm land and with water
shortages,” Gordon said.
Ms. Gordon called for a new institutional framework that would according to her,
“transform rural isolation into a network of hemispheric prosperity.”
IICA she said had broadened its mandate to include more than just providing
technical support, to become more proactive in terms of bringing agriculture,
environment and rural development issues into the wider debate.
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