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Agence Française de Développement (AFD) and the French Facility for Global Environment (FFEM) have committed €4M to provide support to the Caribbean Biodiversity Fund (CBF) and its 12 affiliated National Trust Funds through innovative and sustainable financing tools to protect biodiversity.
The CBF and its partner national conservation trust funds (NCTFs) together form the Caribbean Sustainable Finance Architecture. This Architecture has been key in supporting the original goals of the Caribbean Challenge Initiative. Firstly, to efficiently conserve and manage at least 20% of the marine and coastal environment by 2020, and secondly, to establish sustainable long-term financing mechanisms. In addition, the Architecture also supports the goals of other regional and international commitments.
Building on what the accomplishments of the Caribbean Biodiversity Fund (CBF), the Caribbean Regional Architecture for Biodiversity (CRAB) project has three objectives:
- To strengthen the financial and operational capacities of the Architecture by creating new opportunities of financing, especially for the conservation of biodiversity.
- To position the Architecture as a key player and facilitate regional approaches to biodiversity issues.
- To reinforce its capacity to respond to local and regional conservation needs, including promoting the blue economy and strengthening the recovery capacity of countries in emergency responses
In acknowledging the new partnership, the Chief Executive Officer Karen McDonald Gayle highlighted that, “The CRAB project is a culmination of years of design and development with the Government of France. We are very pleased to be able to facilitate the work of AFD and FFEM in the Caribbean region in the area of sustainable financing. We look forward not only to the continued consolidation and development of the NCTFs in the 12 Caribbean islands we are already working in, but I am equally excited by the new reach into our French Caribbean neighbours.”
Philippe La Cognata, AFD Regional Director in the Atlantic Ocean noted that “Conserving nature while providing a sustainable development for a growing human population is possible! What a sustainable future requires though is fast action. To reach our objectives, the CRAB initiative, financed by Agence Française de Développement and the French Facility for Global Environment, alongside KfW, aims to develop innovative and sustainable financing tools to create new opportunities in the Caribbean region for biodiversity protection.”
This project plans to have far reaching impacts and the partner organizations have given their full commitment to ensuring its success. The CRAB project will be implemented over four years.