Central American countries, Cuba and the Dominican Republic share experiences in climate change adaptation planning
Submitted by esther.lake@undp.org on 04 April 2017
10 February 2017, Panama City: Representatives from Central American countries, Cuba and the Dominican Republic exchanged experiences in the design and implementation of their National Adaptation Plans (NAPs) to climate change in a regional training workshop which took place in Panama City from 8 to 10 February.
During the workshop, all participating countries demonstrated their progress in defining legal and institutional frameworks to adapt to climate change. Country delegations also discussed how implementation remains a major challenge.
National Adaptation Plans (NAPs) seek to reduce the vulnerability of countries to the effects of climate change by building medium to long-term capacity for adaptation and resilience. The process to formulate and implement the NAP also facilitates the integration of adaptation to climate change into government policies and programs.
The regional training workshop was convened by the National Adaptation Plan - Global Support Programme (NAP-GSP), which is jointly implemented by UN Environment and the UN Development Program (UNDP), and funded by the Global Environment Facility (GEF). The workshop was organized with the support from REGATTA, the Global Water Partnership (GWP), the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) and other partner institutions.
The objective of the NAP-GSP is to assist developing countries to advance their NAP process through technical and institutional support, provide guidance regarding access to funds for financing NAPs, and promote the sharing of experiences amongst countries. THis workshop is part of a series of NAP-GSP regional training workshops which have taken place globally since 2014, most recently for the Asia and Pacific region which took place in Colombia in October 2016,. The next regional training workshop to be facilitiated by the NAP-GSP will be held at the end of May in Guyana, for participants from Caribbean countries.
Last year, through the support provided by UN Environment, and in particular the initiative REGATTA, NAP-GSP supported the creation of a community of practice for public officials in Latin America and the Caribbean responsible for developing NAPs. Through this online platform, researchers and specialists in international cooperation, as well as civil society and the private sector, advise countries on issues of common interest for the development of their NAPs.