Episode Transcript
[00:00:01] Speaker A: The best insight, instant feedback, accountability. The all new talk radio Freedom 106.5.
Let's welcome to our program here this morning, executive director of Canary. That's Nicole Lyoto. Good morning to you.
[00:00:17] Speaker B: Good morning.
[00:00:17] Speaker A: Nice to have you with us. And we have Omar Mohammed, CEO of the Cropper foundation. Good morning to you as well.
[00:00:23] Speaker C: Good morning.
[00:00:24] Speaker A: Let's begin by, let me allow both of you to familiarize the listener with both of you and some of the things that you're involved in so that they'll have a greater understanding and appreciation for your perspective. Let's start with uniqle. Tell us a bit about yourself, and tell us about canary.
[00:00:39] Speaker B: So Canary is the Caribbean Natural Resources Institute long name. We are a non profit technical independent institute working across the Caribbean since 1989. So 35 years now. We're headquartered here in Trinidad and Tobago. But we do have scattered around the Caribbean, and we do a lot of work across the region and at the regional level. So we focus on sustainable development, but the angle on sustainable development we focus on is stewardship or taking care of nature so that it benefits not only economies, but livelihoods and people's well being.
[00:01:17] Speaker A: Yeah. And let's hear from you. Tell us.
[00:01:20] Speaker C: Sure. So, like Canari, the Cropper foundation is also a nonprofit organization based here in Trinidad and Tobago. And we work also in the broad scope of sustainability and with a very specific focus as well on building participation. So making sure that whatever development agendas are being put forward are built by and for the people in the region and using their specific, you know, talent and expertise.
[00:01:54] Speaker A: Yeah. It's interesting that we have in this discussion speaking about regional and what is best for the regional, who determines? Because just yesterday we were talking about some of the developments with CXC and how CXC has decided. Well, here you see this, this agriculture, this can be done with that. And nobody seems to know how to arrive with that. And it's interesting, you know, that we have these developments that impact on the region, decisions made. And sometimes you scratch your head and you wonder, well, I wonder how they decide that they're going to do this or what or not and everything else. And it speaks about consultation and whether or not we have enough consultation on matters like these and whether there is the engagement with the populations across the region so that you can foster a conversation that really suits everyone's best interest. Now, it sounds easy, but it's not because you have varying interests across the region. What some island might think it's important to them might not be important to us or what is detrimentally important to us, might be insignificant to somebody else. And striking a balance across all of these discussions is a monumental task. I can just only imagine. But let's explain to our listeners. SIDs four was the conference that took place recently. And out of that we had Penelope Beckles, our minister, making some pronouncements and others make what came out of that? What was the focus of that event and what are some of the positives and negatives that came out of it?
[00:03:30] Speaker C: Well, I can maybe just do a quick intro and maybe hand it over to Nicole because Canary, they do quite a lot of convening, particularly within the Caribbean. And so from my perspective as someone in civil society, the SIDS for conference, well, the SIDS conference, which happens every ten years, so a lot can happen in ten. Intervening ten years, is really to do just what you were just speaking about. You know, this idea of bringing people together to understand what development means and to have some kind of consensus, primarily at the political level, but also to have consensus by the civil society groups, the NGo's that are doing work on the ground, the technical agencies, to understand, okay, these are these big picture development agendas or issues we want to do education, justice, food security. But what does that mean across this diverse group of entities that are small island developing states. So the, the conference really is opportunity to bring all these actors together from the Caribbean. You have Africa, Indian Ocean and South China and then Pacific states. So it's really diverse. And not all islands because Guyana, Suriname, Belize, all considered SIDs as well. So it's really an opportunity again in a very, you know, one might say artificial, where you bring them together for a week and we talk, talk, talk, talk, and we try to build those connections so that we are not just, like you said, thinking about these things in a vacuum. And I'll just make one thing about the education bit, because I did see that about the technical vocational. And again, that's, that's for me is an example of not creating a development pathway that's not really understanding the region that we're in. Why would someone not prioritize agriculture or technical vocation in a region where we already have significant education issues, formal, quote, unquote, formal education issues, and those avenues provide such a fantastic space for so many people. So again, it's just this idea of making these big decisions with the same consultation, understanding what else is going on in the world and in different regions, so that when you get the chance to actual, to make effect change, then it's done within a context that understands resources, available. What else is going on in the world and the needs of your own constituents. But I can hand it over to Nicole to talk maybe more specifically about sits for.
[00:06:17] Speaker B: Thanks. Yeah. So I think to build on what Omar said, we need to understand small island developing states, as Omar said, is not only the Caribbean, they're all over the world in those oceans, Pacific Africa and Indian Ocean, South China seas. But the Caribbean has the most, the biggest number.
And this group of countries was recognized at the United nations level since 1992 as having special needs for sustainable development. They're often small islands. They're isolated, they're remote, they have limited resources, so they're immediately vulnerable. And so the idea is that they need special support for their sustainable development. They're very fragile. Let's think about here in our region. One hurricane could wipe out development progress for years to come. So every ten years, as Umar said, they get together and do a plan, an agenda, a strategy for the next ten years, outlining their sustainable development priorities, which really allows, this is an intergovernmental process, very important. And so they develop this document, this intergovernmental, politically agreed document that actor in Tobago is part of. Of course, that lays out what they see as the priorities, which allows them to then develop partnerships and leverage funding to support their needs.
So the issue is, back to your point, of kind of regionally discussing and agreeing on priorities.
What canary saw very early on in this process, which started since last year, to develop this shared document, is that caribbean civil society, so non governmental actors really didn't have a voice. And as Omar said, you know, why is education not a priority? Why is agriculture not a priority? So we civil society, non governmental people on the ground, see priorities that we want to say need to be addressed. And so what Canary did is work with partners like the Cropper foundation and our vast network of strong organizations across the region. And we came together in a caribbean civil society summit the week before this big intergovernmental conference, so we could work together and share what our priorities are and then develop common areas that we could work together to advocate on and to go to governments and development partners and say, these are important issues.
[00:08:55] Speaker A: As you speak, I just write a number of questions.
It's interesting to me this happens every ten years, and every ten years, they put together a document as to what they want to achieve. In the last ten years, did we achieve what we set out to?
[00:09:12] Speaker B: I can see where you're coming with that.
[00:09:14] Speaker A: No, I mean, it's the obvious question. If every ten years you're planning something and every ten years, you fail to meet what you planned the ten years before. You're spending top in money. You're wasting time. But have we been meeting the objectives that we set out to meet?
[00:09:28] Speaker C: Well, I would maybe say the pessimistic answer, which is no, but I do think that as time goes on, what happens is, yes, it's an intergovernmental process, but I think for, for this, it's for, it feels as if civil society and other non governmental groups are recognizing that not a lot of progress has been made at that level. So the onus really, you know, it shouldn't really fall on us, but we know that, you know, that's what happens. Civil society usually fills in all these gaps that, that's states don't really provide to their, to their constituents. So I think the lack of action, well, my perception of that lack of action is obviously negative. But on the positive side, I think it's really galvanized civil society to be like, okay, once again, we have to step in. And that really what led to the development of a civil society action plan for this agenda? Formal document that says, we, the states, you know, all the fancy language, agree XYZ. And we said, okay, this document isn't enough because, of course, like anything intergovernmental, it's all about compromise. So what you, like you said, like what one state might agree, the other state might be like, absolutely not. So they settle on language which, let's be honest, maybe satisfies no one. And then, so we've taken it upon ourselves as civil society to say, okay, that's what it is. That's the reality. Now, how do we as a group come together and create our own action plan for us to monitor progress? Us as civil society, who, you know, spoiler alert, we do most of the work anyway on the ground. How do we mobilize funding? How do we work together? So, so that's resulted in a civil society ten year action plan in parallel to the main document itself, which Canary helped co convene and also present at the civil society forum last week.
[00:11:41] Speaker A: I'll tell you this, you know, I am as blunt as I can be with my listeners. I don't pretend for them.
And you see these regional discussions with these various heads. I consider them to be a waste of time because we have so many instances when the regional leaders have come together, sit down and talk for however long, and at the end of the day, they put out a document and there's no follow up action.
And I say that without fear of contradiction. I mean, and I can give you two examples. We had in this country a whole big forum for two days on crime, and not just crime. Crime was a health issue which confused, confused everybody that I, I didn't understand it up to now about crime as a health issue. Coming out of the crime as a health issue conference was one statement that said automatic weapons should be banned. That's all that come out of that. And we were told that in August of that year, I think that was last year, whenever it was, they would have a follow up, and we had nothing again.
And then we had four members coming together for agriculture. I think it was Serena and Guyana, Barbados and Trinidad and Tobago. If I'm not wrong, what has happened to that? When you're talking about food, which is some people would consider more important than other things, and there's no follow up action. So these talk shops, if it were not for civil society, many societies would fall on.
Governments wouldn't want to admit that. But that's a fact when it comes to dealing with people who are underprivileged one way or the other, a civil society that steps in and sees after them. When you talk about displaced people and you talk about all the ills they face in society, civil society groups who've decided to themselves, they want to make the world around them a better place. And started with that kind of impetus, they've made the difference. And sadly, they don't get the kind of funding that they need to do much more that they can. So let's talk about funding now, when it comes to how do you survive?
What are some of the programs that you think are important and should get support financially and otherwise? Let's hear.
[00:13:57] Speaker B: I mean, so this SIDs civil society action plan and roadmap that Umar talked about lays out exactly that. Now, this is a global plan, not only caribbean civil society, but from the other regions. And it has a section saying, how can governments and development partners, by development partners, we mean the other countries, the funders, and so on. How can they better enable and support us in civil society to be even more effective? And finance is one area. So, for example, asking for funders to change their type of financing, move away from this short term, very in the box thinking of short term projects to more strategic, long term, programmatic, flexible funding that can really build the capacity of organizations. Right? So Canary and the Cropper foundation are two strong organizations, but there are many smaller organizations struggling who can't maintain staff, who don't have that kind of security. So we need to change the type of financing, and then also channel this global financing down to the ground. So in the climate area, one very strong thing our governments have done and been advocating on for a very long time at the global level, is for the international community to recognize they are responsible for climate change and to channel financing to Sids and other vulnerable countries to help us adapt or to deal with the loss and damage we are already facing. In some cases, you can't adapt. People are relocating from islands, for example. It's really very, very serious and it's happening now. We're facing drought in Trinidad and Tobago. Right. So the idea is, yes, financing needs to go to SIDS, but some of that financing needs to be channeled down to the ground. Exactly. Where civil society works. Local communities who are vulnerable need financing. So in terms of financing, it's urgent. But there are other things like can we have more enabling legal frameworks, right, that allow us to operate and allow us to not have headaches to deal with taxes and bureaucracy with registration?
You know, the type of legal framework that we have is actually a turn off for a lot of people.
[00:16:11] Speaker A: I know exactly what you mean. Trying to register an ngo now is like pulling out a tooth. It is that difficult and it's.
[00:16:20] Speaker C: And when you have, when you pull out that one tooth, you pull out the rest of it. You get a bank account.
[00:16:25] Speaker B: The bank account.
[00:16:27] Speaker A: No, I mean, they operating with the guidelines that have been imposed on them. They don't have a choice. But it's. It's ridiculous. Some of what you have. And at the end of the day, what you're trying to do is help her.
[00:16:39] Speaker B: Correct?
[00:16:40] Speaker A: And now you've. It makes it seem as if you're trying to do something wrong by trying to justify all of these different things and whatever, but it is what it is and we have to deal with it.
Do you think, I mean, you all are, you interact with people all the time, but let's take the discussion to the climate element. Climate change. There are some people who do believe climate change is real, and we have world leaders who do believe climate change is real. We can call no names.
[00:17:08] Speaker B: Well, that's their narrative.
[00:17:10] Speaker A: It is. And here at home, we have people who call the station. I'm sure if I open and say this climate thing, what are they talking about? You know, they do. As a region, as people within the region, do you think we have the appreciation that is needed for this, this discussion on climate change?
[00:17:33] Speaker C: Well, I can go first. So, like you mentioned, Ryan Beetri wrote a couple of articles and one of them, for whatever reason, my face was one of the pictures on social media. And even under those comments, people were like, this climate change thing is a conspiracy. An american thing.
[00:17:53] Speaker A: Yeah, a political conspiracy. That's what you hear.
[00:17:56] Speaker C: So, you know, of course that's an aside. You move on and you. Some of them are trolls. But I do think, though, that there is a lack of on the ground understanding of the connections. I mean, people know it's getting hotter. Like I was telling Nicole, I went, I spend the weekend in Tobago. I don't get sunburned easily. And I am so much like, it's tangibly hotter. And of course, we have all these issues with rainfall and urethane, so people know that something is happening. But to make that connection to this really, this political issue of climate change, because the science is there, we could feel it. But the politics of climate change and like, the language, like you said, the narrative around it is what I think people in the Caribbean have not really latched on to. That's why it doesn't show up in like a political agenda. It doesn't show up in a political party using it as a. As a. Because it's not an issue.
[00:19:03] Speaker A: It doesn't seem to be important.
[00:19:04] Speaker C: It seems important to people. So that's where I think we, as, you know, groups that are working in the climate space, that's one of the things we really need to prioritize. How do we get it on the political agenda, something people care about? Because then if it happens to be to become a political issue, then, like you said, the leaders, then all of a sudden, a light bulb goes off and they consider it important.
So I think there's a lot of work to do there. I mean, in 2017, the EMA, the environmental management Authority, did their national environmental literacy survey. I mean, it's a couple of years ago now, but they looked at, and I could be paraphrasing, like, schools, businesses and households, and one of the big questions they asked were the top, top ten environmental threats facing the country. Climate change for the three of them was somewhere between, like, eight to 10th place, but they had all these symptoms, high up, flooding, fires and so on. So there's still not that connection happening. And I think that opens it up to just dealing with these symptoms. Like you said, with the crime conversation, we're very happy to deal with the symptoms, but when we get down to the root causes like climate change and how we create, like, adaptation approaches and stuff, it feels bigger and more difficult.
So I think there's a lot of work to do there in the advocacy.
[00:20:32] Speaker A: Space, do you think it's a situation where small island states like ours, we small, we don't really think that our contribution to the problem is as great as some of the other larger, more developed countries. So as such, we say, well, not really we problem. There's all the problems. I fix that. There's only so much we could do. At the end of the day, I think that contributes as well to this lack of engagement on this topic.
[00:21:01] Speaker B: I don't think that should be an excuse. It is used as an excuse by some. It should not be. So SIDs collectively across the world contribute less than 1% of the global greenhouse gas emissions which are scientifically proven to cause climate change. Right.
But a country like Trinidad and Tobago, it's different. So per capita or per head, per person in the country, we're very high and embarrassingly so. And therefore, it's not right, it's not moral, it's not ethical for us to sit down and say it's okay for us to continue to be wasteful in terms of our energy use. It's okay for us not to accelerate transition to renewable energy. Yet we are calling on others to do that. So the political language is nuanced now in that developed countries need to transition faster and further.
Right, rather than the SIDs, for example. But it doesn't mean we sit back and do nothing. We also need to show leadership in this area and therefore we can take that moral high ground.
[00:22:12] Speaker A: Yeah. You know, whether you describe it as climate change or what you want to describe it as, there are changes taking place and there are several schools of thought on what's going on.
I've listened to some lectures where people have said, well, this is just the earth growing. And these are the growing pains of the earth. The earth has been around for how many of a hundred million years? And for us to think that humans have an impact that could see the destruction of the earth is.
It's ridiculous. I've actually heard that. And then there are others who are saying, well, there's evidence that something is happening as to whether we are responsible or not does not take away from what's happening. I've seen people post photos of the ice caps that are melting.
Oceans are operating differently now. You have warmer temperatures, you have coastal erosion, which we don't really take on, but it's happening here in Queen Elm. We have higher tides that have washed away portions of the land that were there for a long period of time. We also have now the heat that you've been talking about less rainfall, and so something is happening. And I've had the opportunity to look at some documentaries on this thing. Kiribati Islands, they are among the most impacted significantly in a real way.
That documentary was a real eye opener because we have the same. We have some of the things taking place here at home where you have tides that are different from what you had before and nobody could explain it. It has to be sea level rise.
[00:24:02] Speaker B: It can't be explained.
[00:24:03] Speaker A: Okay.
[00:24:03] Speaker B: And so, I mean, just, I really feel we need to.
We need to recognize the science, right? And the science is extremely strong now and is getting better every year. So we're far away from the era in where the science was, you know, very certain vague people were questioning it. There's so much strong science now and so much focused science. So the University of the West Indies in Mona has a climate studies group that's done endless work on climate change impacts in the caribbean. At our scale, we no longer need to look at the, you know, the ice caps and so on. We understand what's happening in our region. Drought, heavier rainfall, more intense storms, sea level rise, warming oceans, higher air temperatures, higher. You know, this is science. This is known. And so the scientists are getting better at explaining this and communicating this, but we really need to also link that to what we're seeing on the ground. Any common sense person can easily see what's happening. This is not a normal state for the earth.
[00:25:15] Speaker A: Can we fix it? Because at the end of the day, all of these initiatives and everything else they are intended at, I don't want to say reversing, but addressing the problems that we're facing as a world, you know, the globe, can we realistically, I don't want to use the term fix, but, you know, to address.
[00:25:40] Speaker C: Well, I think, you know, again, you have this difference in scale. You have the large countries who were historically metas. You have the large countries now like China and India, who, you know, rapidly developed and now are huge metas as well.
And again, the whole climate change conversation really is a political issue. It's who, you know, who. Okay, well, if I cut by so much, they also have to cut by so much. And, you know, that that's just a dance that goes on. But again, like we, like we've been saying the impacts are happening. While all that, to use your words, that all those talk shops are going on, people are literally dying. And coming back again to the question about what can we do as sids and, you know, maybe more specifically in the Caribbean for the folks who are listening is really, again, what can we focus on? What's in our control. And that's things like adaptation. So if we all cut off our emissions today, probably still gonna get bad storms and sea level rise. But we can try to focus on how do we, as people and countries, adapt ourselves and the way that we live and our sectors and so on to what we know is going to come. Because, as Nicole said, the science is there. We know the waters in the Atlantic are getting warmer, so hurricanes are going to get stronger and much more and much more rapidly. So we know those things are going to happen. We know we got. We have basically no seasons. We know it's just one season where it could be hot today and flood tomorrow. So if we know these things are happening, how do we start allocating? Like you said, funding to make sure that we are able to continue living and continue to have a decent quality of life. And that can be everything from making sure that port of Spain doesn't flood. Every time you think. You think about rain of Spain, floods and people are stranded, people get anxiety. You know, you have this thing, like climate anxiety, where people think it's like a american thing or european thing, but people in Greenville.
[00:27:54] Speaker A: No, no, we have that here.
[00:27:55] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:27:55] Speaker A: Like, from the time you see dark clouds, people start saying, I need to go.
[00:27:59] Speaker C: People start panicking.
So all those things. So how do we start creating systems at home that can take away some of those stresses? So, you know, we have things called nature based solutions, for example, which is where you invest in the ecosystem around us, because, you know, those things are there for a reason. Forests are there for a reason. It's a slow down water, so it doesn't all come in a flood, you know, so how do we invest in those things? Instead of sticking with the traditional concretes and whatever. So how do we help ourselves to adapt? And that's where we have control as people and governments and SIDS. And, you know, it's my own opinion that that should continue to be a priority while we. While we do our responsibilities with reducing emissions. The fact is, we're almost like receivers of this. And we need to make sure that whatever we're receiving, we're still able to at least have a decent way of life.
[00:29:00] Speaker A: Yeah, I need to write my questions down because I have so many questions. We're going to run all the time. But to come back, okay. We've been speaking about action on a level of government, of all these big groups and organizations and everything else. Let's take it down to the individual.
I'm concerned.
If there are people who are concerned, is there something other things that the individual can do? Because, you know, Mahatma Gandhi said, really change your own to see in the world? And that kind of thing. And maybe that's most prominent in this kind of discussion.
Can an individual contribute? And if they can, how?
[00:29:41] Speaker B: I mean, I think, yes, we need to move from burying our head in the sand and recognize that governments cannot do it alone. We need a whole of society approach.
And so certainly, you know, first step is to make yourself more aware. And so programs like this and the role of the media in raising awareness about the issues are critical. And people need to become aware that these are huge issues that are affecting their lives and their children's lives.
At the second level, call on governments to do what they need to do. Hold governments accountable.
We should not be engaging with our governments only every four years, voting.
This is a democracy and we need mechanisms for citizens to have a voice and say, how are my tax dollars being spent?
Is the government developing, making choices in a way that's going to make us more resilient to climate change and not more vulnerable?
Are we putting concrete to everywhere that's causing more flooding? Or are we investing in nature based solutions and ecosystems like Omar says? You know, and at the next level, I would say get involved in civil society is simply a collection of citizens committed to a common cause. Get involved with your church group, your community group, an NGO, you know, any way you can and be part of the solution.
[00:31:07] Speaker A: How do you strike a balance when you have a front page story that says, we can't afford to pay for medicine?
How do you then have a conversation with an administration, anyone? PNM is just in office at this point in time. But when the government says to you here, what going on? You see all them medicine, all again for free. We can't afford to pay for that. How do you tell them, well, here, well, let's see about the environment.
It's a tough, it's a tough discussion to have.
It's about priorities. And I don't know anyone who's listening who would say, well, here we're going on, let's spend less money on health and allocate some of that to making sure that we fight this thing that is upon us. Can we strike that balance?
[00:31:59] Speaker C: Yes, I think, as Nicole said, it's really about not bearing, not giving ourselves an excuse.
And the thing is, I think we're so accustomed to seeing everything in silos because, I mean, it's easier to plan that way, you know, you budget for education, you budget for health, you budget for social services.
But the fact is, don't we think if we become less adaptable to climate change that these health issues are not going to get worse? I mean, you know, we are, it's again, the science is there.
We're getting older as a population. You know, I think, you know, there are many countries calling for people to have more babies and whatever else, because the population is living longer people, we have much more older generations who are also more vulnerable to things like higher temperatures and so on. And so as that increases, the health risks also increase. So, you know, it, things like environments and climate are health issues. I mean, you would have, you know, very specific things like, you know, ncds, uncommunicable diseases and so on, which are all tied to lifestyle, but they're all operating within a climate space for, you know, we don't want to go into too much details, but again, if things like energy, if people don't transition to things that are more renewable and we're dependent on fossil fuels, which are to remind people a finite resource, so costs are, even if they're high now because of the wars and so on, they're going to become more scarce and transport costs increase. So if we have to adjust diets based on that, we have to think will those, will those diets, if we don't adapt, lead to more cases of different types of ncds? So they all are interconnected. So I think it's very important, while we have to deal with some things right now, you know, very specific things right now, we have to also think, and that's, that should be the role of the state, that their role is to have that big picture view and with participle, real participation by the public, make those long term plans. So I think, again, like you said, the role of people is to say, well, yeah, we know you have to budget for that now, but you don't think every place gets hotter that we're gonna have more issues related to cardiovascular issues, you know, whatever. So it's important to keep pushing back and saying it is all interconnected and we've not done well with the siloed approach and we should not try to continue that as a paradigm.
[00:35:00] Speaker A: That's, that's. Unfortunately, we're gonna have to leave it time just flow away from us. The conversation was very engaging and there is so much more to discuss. We've just barely scratched the surface, literally, on all the issues that are related to this topic. I want to thank both of you for being with us here this morning. And I'm sure that we'll have further conversations because this is a topic that will be with us for quite some time. So for those of you who may have joined our conversation midway, our guests this morning, Nicole Lyotov Canari, executive director at Canary, and Omar Mohamed, CEO of the Cropper foundation. This is where I drop the kitchen. Some messages take us up to the top. We do have the best insight, instant feedback, accountability. The all new talk radio Freedom 106.5.
