The De­vel­op­ment Bank of Latin Amer­i­ca and the Caribbean and the Com­mon­wealth Sec­re­tari­at have signed an agree­ment to ad­vance sus­tain­able de­vel­op­ment and cli­mate re­silience ini­tia­tives across Caribbean Small Is­land De­vel­op­ing States (SIDS).

Ac­cord­ing to a re­lease by CAF, "This al­liance will lever­age both in­sti­tu­tions' ex­per­tise to ac­cel­er­ate im­pact­ful projects that pro­mote the eco­nom­ic and en­vi­ron­men­tal well­be­ing of Caribbean na­tions."

CAF’s Ex­ec­u­tive Pres­i­dent, Ser­gio Díaz-Grana­dos, and the Com­mon­wealth Sec­re­tary-Gen­er­al, Pa­tri­cia Scot­land KC, out­lined sev­er­al ar­eas for col­lab­o­ra­tion, all aimed at ad­dress­ing the unique chal­lenges fac­ing SIDS—en­vi­ron­men­tal vul­ner­a­bil­i­ties, ac­cess to eq­ui­table cli­mate fi­nanc­ing, eco­nom­ic shocks, cli­mate adap­ta­tion needs, bio­di­ver­si­ty degra­da­tion, and more.

The state­ment al­so high­light­ed that "An im­por­tant as­pect of the part­ner­ship fo­cus­es on gath­er­ing da­ta and knowl­edge on the de­vel­op­ment is­sues fac­ing Caribbean SIDS, with par­tic­u­lar em­pha­sis on the his­tor­i­cal, po­lit­i­cal, and so­cio-eco­nom­ic cir­cum­stances of the Eng­lish-speak­ing Caribbean. Both par­ties have al­so agreed to de­vel­op and sup­port projects that fo­cus on cli­mate adap­ta­tion and mit­i­ga­tion, ca­pac­i­ty build­ing, and cham­pi­oning the needs of small and vul­ner­a­ble states on the glob­al stage, es­pe­cial­ly by ad­vo­cat­ing for in­creased ac­cess to in­ter­na­tion­al cli­mate fi­nance."

Díaz-Grana­dos, high­light­ed the sig­nif­i­cance of the part­ner­ship, stat­ing “Ad­vo­ca­cy for small and vul­ner­a­ble states is crit­i­cal now more than ever. We are com­mit­ted to cham­pi­oning ac­cess to in­ter­na­tion­al cli­mate fi­nance, eco­nom­ic re­silience, and fis­cal sus­tain­abil­i­ty, and we re­main ded­i­cat­ed to am­pli­fy­ing the voice of Caribbean SIDS on all glob­al plat­forms.”

At the re­cent­ly con­clud­ed CHOGM, the Sec­re­tary-Gen­er­al of the Com­mon­wealth un­der­scored the ur­gency for jus­tice and stronger fi­nan­cial sup­port for SIDS, and the need to re­form in­ter­na­tion­al sys­tems that over­look their chal­lenges.

Dur­ing the sign­ing cer­e­mo­ny, she em­pha­sised “We recog­nise and ap­plaud the vi­tal and com­pelling work that CAF does in the Caribbean, in­clud­ing fi­nanc­ing spe­cialised ini­tia­tives that en­hance tech­ni­cal ca­pa­bil­i­ties of its share­hold­er coun­tries, and en­cour­ag­ing in­no­v­a­tive pro­grams that ad­vance de­vel­op­ment and ben­e­fit peo­ple.”

This agree­ment comes months af­ter the SIDS4 Con­fer­ence in An­tigua and Bar­bu­da, weeks af­ter the Com­mon­wealth Heads of Gov­ern­ment Meet­ing (CHOGM) in Samoa, and on the heels of COP29, where a glob­al spot­light will again be placed on the unique needs of SIDS.

The sign­ing took place at a sym­po­sium held by CAF, in part­ner­ship with the Com­mon­wealth Sec­re­tari­at and the An­tigua and Bar­bu­da High Com­mis­sion, ti­tled “Ac­cel­er­at­ing Col­lec­tive Ac­tion in Sup­port of Caribbean SIDS.” The sym­po­sium was part of CAF’s con­tin­ued com­mit­ment to main­tain­ing mo­men­tum on the unique chal­lenges faced by SIDS and am­pli­fy­ing the Caribbean's voice in ad­vo­cat­ing for ur­gent ac­tion.