Water running to waste from a National Water Commission main.
BRIDGETOWN, Barbados, (CMC) — Caribbean ministers with responsibility for water resources management will meet in Miami next week as the region prepares to participate in the United Nations conference to finalise a Post-2015 Development Agenda known as the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
The SDGs follow and expand on the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) which expire at the end of the year and will be “the global community’s plan of action” for all dimensions of sustainable development for the next 15 years.
The two day 11th Annual High Level Forum (HLF) will begin on August 27 and they will discuss critical regional water and climate issues.
It was not immediately clear if Jamaica’s water minister, Robert Pickersgill, will be representing Jamaica at the conference.
The organisers said both water and climate change are reflected as priorities in the soon to be confirmed SDGs, with Goal 6 being to “Ensure availability and sustainable management of water and sanitation for all” and Goal 13 urging countries to “take urgent action to combat climate change and its impacts”.
The regional ministers meeting is being organised by the Caribbean Water and Wastewater Association (CWWA) and the Global Water Partnership-Caribbean (GWP-C), in collaboration with the Global Environment Facility and is funded by the Caribbean Regional Fund for Wastewater Management (GEF CReW) Project.
It is being held under the theme “Connecting Water to Climate, Economic Growth and Development within the Post-2015 Development Agenda” and forms part of the CWWA’s 24th Annual Conference and Exhibition which is being held in partnership with the Florida Section of the American Water Works Association.
“Some outcomes of the Forum are likely to feed into the contribution to be made by Caribbean Small Island Developing States (SIDS) at the 21st Conference of the Parties (COP) of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change in December to play a pivotal part of global processes for advancing sustainable development,” the organisers said.
Assistant Secretary-General of Human and Social Development of the Caribbean Community Dr. Douglas Slater, will be a keynote speaker at the 11th HLF.