Calls to Action from Public Launch of the Caribbean Strategy for Climate-Resilient Forests and Rural Livelihoods

During and on the heels of The Caribbean Strategy for Climate-Resilient Forests and Rural Livelihoods (CSCRFRL) developed by the Caribbean Natural Resources Institute (CANARI) for the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) launched to the public on December 14th, 2022, CANARI and FAO are calling on stakeholders to help action the strategy. The focus of the strategy is to ensure the continued climate mitigation and adaption roles of forests, as well as protect their important goods and services by shoring up the health and climate resilience of the region’s forests. The strategy is to be implemented by the FAO and CANARI, working in partnership with national government agencies, civil society, academia, and other key stakeholders. 

During the launch, CANARI called on and empowered stakeholder groups to use the published strategy whenever and wherever applicable and appropriate. 

” We need you all to use this strategy as an information source. Civil society…when you are communicating with your parliamentary representatives or otherwise advocating, [you] can advocate and communicate around the specific forestry issues in terms of climate change [using this strategy]. [Also] for those of us in civil society and academia, we have some projects within that strategy that we can flesh out and develop and work together on,” said Dr. Natalie Boodram, CANARI Senior Technical Officer and Project Manager on the CSCRFRL.

“Our academics that are joining us today, these are some of the key research areas we need you all to focus on…these are what our foresters, civil society need help with! For Government agencies, MEA focal points, regional agencies, feel free to use this strategy to design national or regional projects or partner to do so including with CANARI or with FAO. We want you all to recognise how critical this [climate resilience] issue is … and ensure resources are being allocated,” Boodram continued. “Colleagues from the COP-15 event…continue doing what you are doing – we know you all are there arduously pouring over the documents and as much as possible, trying to ensure our SIDS issues are being reflected.” 

In addition to laying out a clear way forward for protecting regional forests and addressing specifically how stakeholders could best aid the implementation of the strategy, the launch of the CSCRFRL laid the groundwork for a fruitful discussion on increasing capacity amongst civil society and regional foresters to do so. Both CANARI and the FAO will keep stakeholders abreast of progress on strategy implementation for year 2023 and beyond.