Jamaica working towards national policy on emissions

KINGSTON, Jamaica, Feb 8, CMC – Prime Minister Andrew Holness says his Cabinet has given instructions for an inter-ministerial committee to move speedily to develop a national policy on emissions.
Holness said he has advised that a draft of the policy is to be completed and presented to Parliament within three months and that it should be ready for the legislative process, if necessary, by the end of this year.
Holness said the move is in response to concerns about poor air quality in some areas of the Corporate Area and St Catherine.
“I think Jamaica is developing a deep culture towards sustainable development and the government is in the forefront of that in many respects, he noted.
Meanwhile, Minister of Foreign Affairs and Foreign Trade, Kamina Johnson Smith, says Jamaica is expected to ratify the Paris Agreement within soon.
“I am hoping there will be no delays. The issue has been ensuring that we put in place the national framework, the domestic changes to legislation and monitoring and that will allow us when we ratify, to implement,” she said.
The Paris Agreement seeks to strengthen the global response to the threat of climate change by keeping a global temperature rise this century well below two degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels and to pursue efforts to limit the temperature increase even further to 1.5 degrees Celsius.
The agreement was entered into force in October 2016 when it was ratified by 129 of the197 parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC).