Una May Gordon
Photo Credit: Amandala

Jamaica has received from the Green Climate Fund (GCF) for capacity-building support to the tune of US$300,000 for the Climate Change Division, acting as national designed authority (NDA) with the fund.

The new boss at the division, Una May Gordon, made the revelation in an interview with The Gleaner earlier this week.

“We are going to get some support to ready ourselves so we can assist the many and varied stakeholders to make the right decisions for finance,” she said.

“We should be hearing from them (GCF) very soon in terms of the grant agreement and so on,” she added.

More than a year ago, Jamaica was named NDA with the fund, which is tasked to “limit or reduce greenhouse gas emissions in developing countries and to help vulnerable societies adapt to the unavoidable impacts of climate change”, according to information from its website.

This declaration, which has a total of 22 LAC signatory countries (4 of which are from the Eastern Caribbean), is seeking to improve rights of access to information, encourage public participation and ensure access to justice in environmental matters.

As such, it was timely for the Communications & Advocacy Officer at the Saint Lucia National Trust (SLNT) and Elected Representative of the Public on this process, Karetta Crooks Charles, to issue a call for greater involvement of…

The International Union for the Conservation of Nature’s (IUCN) World Conservation Congress (WCC), ‘Planet at the Crossroads,’ opened on 1 September in Honolulu, Hawai’i, the US. The WCC will focus on the challenge of attaining the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) over the next 15 years. Over 6,000 participants from around the world are expected to attend the WCC, making it the largest gathering of environmental policymakers since the Paris Agreement on Climate Change and agreement on the SDGs.

The WCC is IUCN’s highest decision-making body and meets every four years to bring together leaders from government, the public sector, non-government organizations (NGOs), business, UN agencies and indigenous and grassroots organizations to discuss and decide on solutions to global environment and development challenges.

Among other objectives, the World Conservation Congress will launch the Hawai’i commitments: globally transformative and innovative conservation initiatives to meet the critical challenges and opportunities of our time…

The Trust Fund is a newly established and independent scheme aimed at raising money to tackle the territory’s climate change-related issues, by increasing energy efficiency and utilizing alternative energies.

After residents give their feedback on the applicants by September 16 this year, nine persons will be chosen to sit on the Board.

The selection will be done by Premier Dr D Orlando Smith and Dr Kedrick Pickering who is the minister of natural resources and labour.

For the month of July 2016, a total of 33,665 documents were retrieved from the Caribbean Community Climate Change Centre’s (CCCCC) Regional Clearinghouse. A list of the top 20 documents are listed in the table below. If you would like to research and read other documents from CARICOM member states visit the CCCCC’s Clearinghouse.

The Regional Clearinghouse is an extensive repository of Caribbean specific information on climate change and information exchange system for climate resilient decision-making.

It helps users to:

• search, access, request and contribute digital documents, project reports and scholarly articles related to climate change in the Caribbean
• View climate projections by country
• Search the CCCCC hardcopy and CD library
• Access the 2011 Regional Project Stock Take
• Learn more

By using the Clearinghouse Search, decision makers and practitioners will be able to retrieve, request, contribute  and exchange information and data on climate change in the region.

On a warming Earth, seas inevitably rise, as ice on land melts and makes its way to the ocean. And not only that — the ocean itself swells, because warm water expands. We already know this is happening — according to NASA, seas are currently rising at a rate of 3.5 millimeters per year, which converts to about 1.4 inches per decade.

However, scientists have long expected that the story should be even worse than this. Predictions suggest that seas should not only rise, but that the rise should accelerate, meaning that the annual rate of rise should itself increase over time. That’s because the great ice sheets, Greenland and Antarctica, should lose more and more mass, and the heat in the ocean should also increase.

The problem, or even mystery, is that scientists haven’t seen…

Worthy of being cherished?

W.J. Astore

The U.S. Constitution and especially the Bill of Rights is the foundation of our democracy.  If you had to pick a right to celebrate, perhaps even to cherish, which would it be?  There are so many important ones, such as freedom of speech, freedom of the press, freedom of assembly, freedom of religion, our right to privacy (the fourth amendment), and so on. There are other amendments that righted old wrongs, including prohibitions against slavery and the granting of the vote to Blacks and women.

Yet which right/amendment is the best known in U.S. politics today?  The second amendment, or the right to bear arms, which Mike Pence referred to yesterday when he noted, “people who cherish the Second Amendment have a very clear choice in this election.”

OK, I’ve owned guns and enjoy shooting, but I hardly “cherish” my right to spend thousands…

UNOPS is seeking to recruit a Legal Water Expert to develop a national Water Legislation/Act for the government of Mauritius.

Vacancy code: VA/2016/B5303/10626

Position title: Legal Water Expert

Level: ICS-11

Department/office: AFR, KEOH, Kenya

Duty station: Home based

Contract type: International ICA

Contract level: IICA-3

Duration: 4 months

Application period: 10-Aug-2016 to 18-Aug-2016

For more information on the complete Terms of reference and how to apply, kindly visit the UNOPS Global Personnel Recruitment System website.