By Julie Shaw
The Critical Ecosystem Partnership Fund (CEPF) will soon launch an investment of $6.5 million in the Caribbean Islands biodiversity hotspot that aims to provide crucial support to ecosystems that are vital to people and nature.
CEPF’s Donor Council recently approved the five-year strategy for $6.5 million in funding for the hotspot as part of a major expansion being undertaken by the program. CEPF is now in the process of reviewing proposals from organizations seeking to serve as the regional implementation team for the hotspot as a first step before grants will become available later this year.
This month, the Donor Council also approved $400,000 in emergency assistance for Haiti in the wake of the devastating earthquake that struck the island in January.
"The Caribbean Islands are wonderfully rich in biodiversity, but they also contains sites with the highest number of threatened species in the world," said CEPF Grant Director Michele Zador. "Many of these sites also provide vital ecosystems services that have direct benefits to the citizens of this island hotspot. Our plan is to work with local civil society groups to enable the conservation of vital ecosystems that benefit nature and people alike.”
The Caribbean Islands Hotspot is made up of thousands of islands, mainly in three large groups between North and South America: the Bahamas, the Lesser Antilles and the Greater Antilles — Puerto Rico, Jamaica, Cuba and Hispaniola, which includes the Dominican Republic and Haiti. It consists of 30 nations and territories, each characterized by unique and wide-ranging biodiversity and culture. As a result of the region’s geography and climate, it is one of the world’s greatest centers of endemic biodiversity, or species that can be found nowhere else.
The region’s ecosystems provide vital freshwater resources, help to mitigate the impacts of hurricanes, regulate local climate and rainfall, prevent soil erosion, produce hydroelectricity and yield locally consumed non-timber forest products.
Additionally, the hotspot spans more than 4 million square kilometers of ocean and has many thousands of kilometers of productive coastal and near-shore habitats. The coastal and marine environments are essential for the tourism and fisheries sectors. Its terrestrial and marine ecosystems host unique assemblages of flora and fauna of high global importance.
The team that authored the investment strategy — also known as the ecosystem profile — conducted an extensive stakeholder process in the region to guide the strategy. It includes an overview of biodiversity importance; key policy, civil society and socioeconomic context; and overall targets for and major threats to conservation. It also is informed by an analysis of current and planned conservation investment by organizations working in the region. Local nongovernmental organizations, academic institutions and governments from islands throughout the Caribbean contributed to the strategy. It will serve as both a guide to CEPF’s support in the region and a road map for national governments, donors and others planning to implement or invest in conservation and development efforts in the Caribbean.
Chief goals of the strategy include:
- Improving protection and management of 45 priority key biodiversity areas.
- Integrating biodiversity conservation into landscape and development planning and implementation in six priority conservation corridors.
- Supporting Caribbean civil society to achieve biodiversity conservation by building local and regional institutional capacity and by fostering stakeholder collaboration.
- Providing strategic leadership and effective coordination of CEPF investment through a regional implementation team.
CEPF aims to strengthen the hotspot’s most important biological sites and corridors so that they continue to sustain rich and diverse habitats and provide vital services for the people of the Caribbean. It also seeks to better prepare the region to withstand looming threats from global climate change.
While information from all countries in the hotspot has been compiled, the CEPF investment strategy focuses on the following countries currently eligible to receive CEPF funds: Antigua and Barbuda, Bahamas and Barbados, Dominica, Dominican Republic, Grenada, Haiti, Jamaica, St. Kitts and Nevis, St. Lucia, and St. Vincent and the Grenadines.
The profile was developed by BirdLife International (Caribbean Program) in collaboration with Durrell Wildlife Conservation Trust / Bath University, and the New York Botanical Garden, with technical support from Conservation International’s Center for Applied Biodiversity Science.
Investment strategies are also currently in final stages of development for two additional hotspots: the Mediterranean Basin and Maputaland-Pondoland-Albany in southeastern Africa.