By Caribbean Medical News Staff
Trinidad and Tobago is the first CARICOM state and the third member of the Small Island Developing States (SIDs) to submit its unconditional commitment to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by December 2030 in the public transportation sector. This is called the Intended Nationally Determined Contributions or INDC. In order to fulfil the INDC commitments, the Low Emission Capacity Building Project (LECB) was developed with an Implementation Plan for the INDC being a key component.
The Environmental Policy and Planning Division in collaboration with the UNDP conducted a consultation on the LECB focusing on T&T’s Nationally Appropriate Mitigation Actions (NAMAs) in T&T’s power, transport and industry sectors. Representatives from governmental institutions, the energy sector, transport and education attended with presentations ranging from the T&T Civil Aviation Authority to the Energy Chamber as well as full participation within working groups.
The LECB Project has the following main outputs, including the development of:
(i) Sectoral Low-Carbon Development (LCD) Action Plans;
(ii) Nationally Appropriate Mitigation Actions (NAMAs);
(iii) Monitoring, Reporting and Verification (MRV) Systems for the implemented measures;
(iv) An Implementation Plan for Trinidad and Tobago’s recently submitted Intended Nationally Determined Contributions (iNDCs).
In January 2011 the European Union and the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) launched the Global Low Emission Capacity Building (LECB) Programme, in order to meet the requirements of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) to support developing countries’ efforts to address greenhouse gas emissions.
Trinidad and Tobago is one of twenty-five (25) participating countries in the LECB Programme. In order to facilitate these objectives, the Ministry of Planning and Development (MPD), together with the UNDP, coordinated a National LECB Project. This builds on the activities and outputs of the Carbon Reduction Strategy (CRS), which focuses on the power generation, transportation and industry sectors in Trinidad and Tobago.
Workshops are being coordinated with the main objective of encouraging contributions from public institutions, NGOs, researchers, private companies and financing institutions on the implementation of NAMAs in Trinidad and Tobago. Through these sectoral technical working groups, stakeholders will have the opportunity to bring forward their valued ideas and approaches to moving the country towards a clean development path.
