The Sev­enth Caribbean Sus­tain­able En­er­gy Fo­rum (CSEF) host­ed by the Caribbean Com­mu­ni­ty (Cari­com) Sec­re­tari­at and the Caribbean Cen­tre for Re­new­able En­er­gy and En­er­gy Ef­fi­cien­cy (CCREEE) which kicked off on Mon­day is seek­ing to ad­dress the most press­ing sus­tain­able en­er­gy chal­lenges and op­por­tu­ni­ties fac­ing the re­gion.

The fo­rum falls with­in the an­nu­al ob­ser­vance of Cari­com en­er­gy month, which this year has as its theme, “From De­pen­dence to Re­silience: Fu­elling our Re­cov­ery with Sus­tain­able En­er­gy.”

In a state­ment CCREEE said the event is be­ing held af­ter it was de­ferred last year due to the COVID-19 pan­dem­ic and comes on the heels of the just-con­clud­ed Unit­ed Na­tions Cli­mate Change Con­fer­ence (COP 26).

Bar­ba­dos’ Min­is­ter of En­er­gy, Small Busi­ness and En­tre­pre­neur­ship, Ker­rie Sym­monds who gave the keynote ad­dress said sus­tain­able de­vel­op­ment—whether al­ter­na­tive or re­new­able en­er­gy—must be at the fore­front of trans­form­ing our re­gion­al economies. The min­is­ter fur­ther high­light­ed the chal­lenges the re­gion faces.

“Our ge­o­graph­i­cal pre­dis­po­si­tion of be­ing ex­posed to sud­den and dis­as­trous ex­oge­nous shocks…places us all on the front line in the fight against cli­mate change. Equal­ly sig­nif­i­cant is the fact that we’re al­so vul­ner­a­ble to the wa­ver­ing in­ter­na­tion­al fi­nan­cial com­mit­ments to the mit­i­ga­tion and adap­ta­tion strate­gies which the world must adopt,” Sym­monds said

Bar­ba­dos’ al­so com­mit­ted to re­gion­al co­op­er­a­tion in­tend­ed to wean the re­gion away from an un­healthy de­pen­dence on fos­sil fu­els, through sup­port for re­gion­al or­gan­i­sa­tions.

Fur­ther recog­nis­ing the role re­gion­al in­te­gra­tion plays in ad­vanc­ing the sus­tain­able en­er­gy agen­da and build­ing re­silience, new­ly ap­point­ed Deputy Sec­re­tary Gen­er­al of Cari­com Dr Arm­strong Alex­is not­ed that CSEF’s ac­tu­al­i­sa­tion is a les­son in re­silience.

“Dis­rup­tions serve as re­minders of the chal­lenges Cari­com coun­tries con­tin­ue to face which of­ten stymie progress and ex­pose us to ex­ter­nal shocks,” he said.

Alex­is added that the COVID-19 pan­dem­ic has brought the re­gion’s vul­ner­a­bil­i­ty in­to sharp fo­cus.

Am­bas­sador of the Eu­ro­pean Union to Bar­ba­dos, the OECS and Cari­com, Mal­go­rza­ta Wasilews­ka echoed sen­ti­ments from Prime Min­is­ter of Bar­ba­dos, Mia Mot­t­ley that “it is enough talk­ing; we need ac­tion now.” Not­ing that sus­tain­able en­er­gy is a key el­e­ment of the en­er­gy tran­si­tion, Wasilews­ka said the EU al­so pledged its sup­port.

Cana­da’s High Com­mis­sion­er to Bar­ba­dos and the OECS, Lil­ian Chat­ter­jee who al­so par­tic­i­pat­ed said it is recog­nised that Caribbean SIDS are high­ly vul­ner­a­ble to the im­pacts of cli­mate change and oth­er ex­ter­nal eco­nom­ic shocks, in­clud­ing fu­el price vari­abil­i­ty.

“Re­duc­ing re­liance on fos­sil fu­els in the is­lands is there­fore not just about re­duc­ing car­bon emis­sions but al­so, about eco­nom­ic re­silience,” Chat­ter­jee added.