Minister Habet Assumes Pro-Tempore Presidency of SICA’s Environment & Development Commission
Back in early December, Prime Minister John Briceño received the presidency pro-tempore of the Central American Integration System (SICA) from Dominican Republic President, Luis Abinader Corona at a meeting of Heads of State and Government of SICA in Santiago de Caballeros, Dominican Republic. And so, for six months, from January to June, PM Briceño will be advancing efforts on the implementation of SICA’s regional agenda. Today, a similar ceremony was held at the House of Culture in Belize City, where Minister of Sustainable Development, Climate Change and Disaster Risk Management Orlando Habet received the pro-tempore presidency of the Central American Commission on Environment and Development (CCAD). News Five’s Duane Moody reports.
Duane Moody, Reporting
Today, before stakeholders from the sustainable development community and representatives from the diplomatic corps, Minister of Sustainable Development, Climate Change and Disaster Risk Management, Orlando Habet was conferred the Central American Commission on Environment and Development banner from the Dominican Republic. With that gesture, Belize assumes the pro-tempore presidency of the SICA committee to push forward environmental priorities for the next six months.
Jair Urriola Quiroz
Jair Urriola Quiroz, Executive Secretary, CCAD
“The pro-tempore presidency rotates every six months which presents a challenging task to guarantee the continuity of this process, however, I can say without fear of being mistaken that this continuity has been achieved through the previous pro-tempore presidency that the CCAD has been in creating and strengthening on the commitment of each holder of the presidency – last year with Dominican Republic and Panama.”
Last year, several initiatives and projects were approved under the leadership of the Dominican Republic and new regional priorities were promoted – some of which now fall under Minister Habet and his team.
Orlando Habet
Orlando Habet, Minister of Sustainable Development, Climate Change & Disaster Risk Management
“For us, it is significant because we have on our agenda at least six or seven priority areas that we want to stress and we want to see accomplished by the time we come out. We have projects within Central America and the Caribbean which are sponsored by the same partners in development; we have the U.K. which is assisting us with the biodiversity landscape fund which is a regional project. We have the projects for the five great projects for Meso-America which is also a landscape project that not only looks at the conservation or preservation of the forests at the landscape level, but looks specifically at communities that are affected.”
Minister Habet says that Belize has its own priorities that will improve the regional work not only for SICA, but also improving the linkage with CARICOM for which Belize plays a critical role.
Orlando Habet
“Important is that integration between CARICOM and SICA. Last year, there was a CARICOM/SICA meeting and at that meeting it was informed that we have to strengthen that partnership; there is so much politically, but also economically that we can benefit from and so we have to strengthen that partnership. But also because of our quest within the biodiversity and the climate change arena that we have to work together because we are small island states in the Caribbean and small countries in Central America which are all small developing countries. And so, we have some of the same effects from climate change, we have some of the same needs and really the people can integrate and come together with sharing of those experiences like I mention, sharing expertise and there is no reason for us to be duplicating efforts if we already have something that has worked in one country and we can copy and do what we can in our country.”
Duane Moody for News Five.
Agriculture Minister Jose Abelardo Mai has also taken over the Commission for Agriculture under SICA.
