PRIME MINISTER P.J. Patterson has thrown his support behind an international drive for small island developing states, such as Jamaica and others in the Caribbean, to get a fair share of a major facility to channel funding to halt and correct the degradation of land and the worsening of poverty that results.
He has urged the United Nations Convention to Combat Decertification (UNCCD), now holding its 6th conference in Havana, Cuba to set up a mechanism for this financing flow as well as for providing technical assistance to poor and vulnerable countries.
"If we are to deal with the issues of land degradation in any meaningful way, we need to remain focused on attracting financial and technical assistance, including support for technology transfer and capacity building," Mr. Patterson said. He added that, "Ja-maica urges this conference to accept the offer of the Global Environmental Facility to become a financial mechanism to this Convention."
LOSS OF LAND
The Prime Minister told the conference, which heard contributions from Heads of Government from countries in the Caribbean, South America and Africa, that the loss of land and the spread of dry and desert conditions were closely related to other problems such as urbanisation, natural disasters resulting from climate change and the inability of countries to feed their populations.
He noted that while the Caribbean was once famous for its large plantations, declining productivity from land resources now made it one of the most food insecure regions in the world.
He summed up the major challenges now facing the islands as including how to produce enough food to feed their own people, how to arrest the alarming rate of land degradation and how to reverse the spread of rapid urbanisation.
While making the case for the real and urgent need for serious attention to be paid to areas such as Africa, Mr. Patterson was emphatic in outlining the special case for resources and technology to prevent the collapse of small island economies and improve social and economic conditions for their peoples. Noting that Africa accounted for the largest portion of the one billion people affected by decertification worldwide, the Prime Minister drew attention to such factors as limited natural and human resources, small economies with low levels of diversification, small physical size and high population densities, which he said, rendered small islands states particularly vulnerable.
He spoke of the drastic changes in weather patterns around the world and the droughts, floods and heat waves that were resulting in alarming levels of death and damage to infrastructure and agriculture. He warned that as is the case in the spread of epidemics, changes in climatic conditions were not confined to any particular geographical boundaries. "The contagion affects us all. No country, large or small, developed or developing is insulated."
"As we watch the devastating consequences of these phenomena in other parts of the world, we must recognise that none of us are immune and we must take decisive action now to avert any worsening of the present situation."
Mr. Patterson expressed disappointment at the non-fulfilment of promises made by developed countries to increase development assistance to poorer states. He said he was looking to the UNCCD to give effect to the commitments made at such meetings as the Millennium Summit in New York in 2000, the recent Doha Round of World Trade Organisation negotiations, the Monterrey Summit of developed countries and the 2002 Johannesburg Summit on Sustainable Development.
