Mitigating the Impacts of Climate Change

Climate change requires urgent action from all countries to build resilience against the phenomenon.  Back in 2015, the Government of Belize approved a national climate change policy and established a National Climate Change Office, which has been working on developing partnerships and getting the country the much needed assistance and support to adapt to climate change. While Belize’s greenhouse gas emissions are miniscule, other actions have been taken to mitigate the impacts of climate change.

Lennox Gladden

Dr. Lennox Gladden, Chief Climate Change Officer, N.C.C.O.

“Although the national climate change office falls under the Ministry of Sustainable Development, Climate Change and Disaster Risk Management, we still look at climate change not only from an environmental standpoint, but we factor as well the social and economic impacts. Our reality, this is what is happening in the southern part of the country where we see some coastal erosion. As an office, we realised that there was a gap when it looks at the overall capacity building and so this is the approach because we want to at every juncture not only enhance the skills of those in the office, but also within out sister ministries and also assisting N.G.O.s in this process so for standardization and looking at improving the quality.”