PM Briceño Lobbied for Climate Change Funds
Prime Minister John Briceño returned to the country on Monday after participating in the World Climate Industry Expo – Leaders’ Summit in Busan, South Korea. The summit focused on global cooperation and solidarity against climate change. During his visit, Prime Minister Briceño and his delegation met with the Global Green Growth Institute (GGGI) to discuss Belize’s membership and capacity-building opportunities. They also visited the Green Climate Fund (G.C.F.) headquarters to address project approvals and accreditation matters. According to the Prime Minister, the meeting was fruitful.
Prime Minister John Briceño
“We had a very good meeting with the GCF. And for the first time a Prime Minister Belize have met with the officials of GCF and what we are telling them is that we are urging them that they need to be able to move quicker in with their, with their program, with their projects. We have a proposal with them, a radar for 50 million US to be able to expand both the water system and solar system in the San Pedro. Now they have told us that they have responded to our project, now they have sent it back to the 5Cs who is the handling the project for us. So from there, Dr. Martinez, the CEO of Economic Development, has already alerted the 5Cs here in Belize that they need to respond more quickly. And so that’s one of the things that we’re going to be responding with them. We spoke to them also about attempting to get $20 million also for farmers, again, for climate resiliency. And we then brought up the issue of probably getting more funding for both citrus and for bananas that are going through a crisis at the moment.”