Region Urged to Adopt Education Programs Focusing on Climate Change

KINGSTOWN, St. Vincent – Caribbean Week of Agriculture (CWA) began here on Monday with St. Vincent and the Grenadines (SVG) Agriculture Minister Saboto Caesar calling on the region to adopt educational programs that focus on the impact of climate change.

“Our education system, from the preschool to the tertiary level, must be ready to adapt their programs to include specific areas of climate action,” Caesar said three months after Beryl, an uncharacteristically early category 4 cyclone, devastated the country’s agricultural sector.

“This is not the time for anyone to be asking whether we drop agriculture science as a subject, but we must use the exigencies of our times to encourage more study in agriculture and fisheries at all levels.”

The week-long event is being held under the theme “Climate Smart Agriculture for a Sustainable Future”.

Caesar said that at United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP 28) in Dubai, the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) region reasoned that climate change is the greatest threat to achieving Vision 25 by 2025 CARICOM Initiative, through which regional leaders have committed to reducing the region’s large food import bill by 25 per cent by 2025.

The minister noted that the theme for this year’s CWA was launched on June 14, this year “and in my country, if I may, borrow from the vernacular, I hope we did not call wolf,” an apparent reference to the impact Hurricane Beryl had on the country 16 days later.

“St. Vincent and the Grenadines, having just given a global invitation to come to SVG to discuss climate-smart agriculture for a sustainable future, was struck by a category 4 hurricane,” Caesar said, adding that the storm destroyed 98 per cent of the nation’s bananas and plantains.

“Hundreds of fishing boats wholly or partially destroyed, and a tuna vessel from SVG was later found in the Cayman Islands,” he said, adding that the country was taken “to the brink of food insecurity”.

Caesar  said that the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO)  continues to provide significant technical support needed for regional technicians to retool themselves and to be able to address the vagaries of climate change.

“The USAID Caribbean Agricultural Productivity Improvement Activity (CAPA) project “continues to bring fresh hope in our efforts to rethink climate-smart strategies, targeting an increase in agriculture production.”

Caesar said the University of the West Indies (UWI), through the launch of the postgraduate diploma in climate resilient agricultural extension for community development, “has sent a clear message that time is of the essence”.

He said that the programme says all member states must complete a situational analysis related to their readiness to address climate change mitigation, complete a national asset mapping exercise to be able to define the resources available and needed for climate-smart agriculture; a clear methodology for a well-defined, structured and conceived national climate-smart food production plan must be established, and national budgets must be geared at executing these plans.

“All of the players are in the room here today. We need a week of focused discussions,” he told the opening ceremony, adding, “we must identify the agroecological zones in our member states that we know are naturally more resilient than others”.

Caesar said that the Marriaqua Valley in St. Vincent was so identified earlier that day, adding, “there are many other valleys throughout CARICOM member states which must be identified.”

The agriculture minister said food has always played a critical role in shaping world history.

“Whether it was the search across the Bering Strait, the settlements along the Nile, the movement down through Latin America and the movement up the Orinoco river and through the lesser and Greater Antilles, or the search for raw material in the West Indies,” he said.

“Now, I predict that where we can and cannot grow food as a result of climate change will have a significant impact on the next wave of human migration. Our farmers, fishers, agro-processors and agro-chain mobilisers, we love you,” he said.

“CWA 2024 is about our appreciation for our hard work. to be or not to be. Let us ensure that we play our part while we have the responsibility so to do.

Meanwhile, the executive director of the Trinidad-based Caribbean Agricultural Research and Development Institute (CARDI), Ansari Hosein, said the theme of CWA 2024 “is indeed relevant to the regional context as climate change remains one of our most significant development challenges”.

He said that over the last nine months, the region has experienced the effects of extreme heat spells, prolonged droughts, water shortages, intense rainfall and floods, “all destabilising our food systems and disrupting production, access and availability.

“And when these things happen, it is the rural communities, smallholder farmers and the poor among us, that are hardest hit.”

Hosein noted the trail of destruction that Hurricane Beryl left across the Caribbean.

“Preliminary loss and damage estimates for the agricultural sector across all impacted islands have been estimated in the vicinity of US$159 million,” he said, adding that this is a  significant loss for a region that is working to reduce its six billion US dollar annual food import bill.

“The total cost is significantly more,” the CARDI official said, pointing out that just before Beryl, Guyana’s President Irfaan Ali “gave a positive outlook, reporting that in the first quarter of 2024, CARICOM member states had recorded a 30 per cent achievements of target set and 12 per cent decline in real imports, equal to a quarter billion dollars.

“But this is what climate extremes can do. It can derail the achievement of our goals and targets in the blink of an eye.”

Hosein said that the promotion, creation and adoption of climate-smart agriculture is “critical to addressing how we treat with this issue of low production and productivity, building resilience, reducing emissions as little as they may be, we need to pivot now and really climate-proof our cultural sector”.

He said CARDI has been working on building climate resilience in agriculture for over a decade.

“And while we would have made measured progress with these initiatives, the expansion has really been stymied by underinvestment in agricultural research and development,” Hosein said, adding that this has been the case with the private and public sectors.

“And while we encourage private sector investment, it is not meant to be a substitute for public sector investment. It is meant to be complimentary.”

He said a research paper from the International Food Policy Research Institute published last year notes considerable evidence that investing in agriculture research is a highly effective pathway for reducing poverty and hunger and addressing climate change impacts on food systems.

“It goes on to say that regardless of the mode of investments, time frame and specific targets for adaptation chosen, studies have consistently shown that spending on agricultural research has had a greater impact on our productivity than other types of public expenditures.”

Hosein said the paper further stated that agricultural research spending has also performed best or second best when it comes to reducing poverty.

This is whether the comparison is with other investments such as irrigation, soil conservation incentives or other investments in other rural areas, such as health, education and roads.

“So, the data is out there to support the case for increased R and D public sector funding. Why then do we spend so little on it?” he said.

Hosein encouraged the region to scale up innovative solutions and implement large-scale projects that will “have the transformative impact needed to drive socio-economic growth and economic resilience”.