(CARICOM Secretariat, Turkeyen, Greater Georgetown, Guyana) The call for greater collaboration among agencies responsible for weather and climate services as well as a coordinated response to Climate Change was the motif of this morning’s opening ceremony of the 48th Session of the Caribbean Meteorological Council.

In his feature address at the Liliendaal Venue in Georgetown, Guyana, the Hon. Robert Persaud, Guyana’s Minister of Agriculture described as critical, the role of the Caribbean Meteorological Organisation (CMO) and the Caribbean Institute for Meteorology and Hydrology (CIMH) in providing services which he asserted were integral to the survival of the Region, especially in the areas of food security and economic viability.

In this regard, he said, CARICOM Member States and civic society needed to work together in supporting the CMO in “strengthening our ties to develop mutually supportive networks in meteorology and operational hydrology.”

In addition to providing other services critical to the identification and tracking of natural disasters, the CMO and the CIMH provide data necessary for appropriate prediction and response to the effects of climate change and as such, Minister Persaud declared that such services were critical to and linked to other developmental activities and urged the delegates to re-examine the role of the CMO in light of changing and new realities.

“As we strive to address the global concerns relating to climate and the environment, we should continue to develop and adapt our approaches to the changing socio-economic conditions and the requirements to make the best use of the new scientific and technological knowledge,” the Minister said.

CARICOM Assistant Secretary-General, Dr Edward Greene agreed and asserted that the need for closer collaboration and greater coordination between agencies involved in developmental activities at national and regional levels is critical in light of resource constraints and in light of the fact that already, scarce resources were invariably diverted from other social, economic and infrastructure programmes to respond to disasters.

The Honourable Ian Douglas, Dominica’s Minister of Tourism and Legal Affairs who gave the vote of thanks cited natural disasters as one of the major threats to regional development and noted that collaboration among Member States and not individual efforts was the preferred response to disaster mitigation.

CONTACT: piu@caricom.org