With the fourth Small Island Developing States (SIDS) conference officially one month away, the director of Policy and Planning within the Ministry of Tourism believes that the excitement is palpable with a vast majority of high-end rooms already booked.
More than 3,000 persons expected to descend on the island from May 27-30 to take part in a series of events hosted by a number of organisations to discuss how to improve the lives and livelihoods of persons in small island states.
St Clair Soleyn, the Director of Policy and Planning, said that in preparation for the event, the procurement of sufficient caterers and security personnel have been sought.
“We are registering properties at a very high rate and we’re hoping to get sufficient or above sufficient levels of rooms ready for the SIDS conference.
“The security is in place, and we have already settled with the caterers and the compound transportation is moving along at this stage, we are in good stead to have a spectacular conference,” Director Soleyn informed our newsroom.
He also said additional meetings will be held to review all plans for the conference, including ensuring that educating volunteers and other personnel on what to expect from attendees who will all bring their own cultural experiences and nuances.
“We will have another gathering for the simple reason that there’s some things we need to sensitize people about especially the persons who will be involved in the hospitality industry—these people are coming from around the world with different cultures, different behaviours, and we have to get our people sensitized to look for certain things,” he articulated.
The official outcome document for this year’s SIDS conference called ‘The Antigua and Barbuda Agenda for SIDS (ABAS) – a Renewed Declaration for Resilient Prosperity’, has been unanimously approved by Member States
The document outlines the next steps for sustainable development for SIDS for the next decade and will reaffirm that “despite the significant progress SIDS have made over the past three decades, they remain a special case for sustainable development due to their unique vulnerabilities.”
Expected to be formally approved at the closing session of the SIDS conference, the document lays out some of the challenges that SIDS continue to collectively face like data collection and analysis, the need to improve productive capacity to export more goods than small islands import.
This, the document outlines, will be done through the undertaking of a National Productive Capacities Gap Assessments (NPCGAs), and investing in higher productivity sectors including in advanced technologies and digital economy to provide better paying jobs for people in SIDS and reduce brain drain and labour mobility.
Additionally, with the devastation of climate change has had on the dynamics of small islands to sustain and continuously improve their economies, the impact of this conference will be more than just a chance for the international community to hear but another chance for larger nations to understand the impact climate change has had on small islands on the ground.
“When you have all these people coming together, working towards one common goal, it has been proven that it will be successful,” Environmental Awareness Group’s Johnella Bradshaw said, referencing the work that has been accomplished to save endangered species as well as Redonda.
As the draft outcome document explains, recognizing the various anthropogenic pressures and adverse impacts of climate change, the need to foster a sustainable energy transition, develop integrated water resource management and enhance food security require the support of the international community.