Statement by
Mr. Zéphirin Diabré
Associate Administrator
United Nations Development Programme (UNDP)

Honourable Ben Clare, Minister of State in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Foreign Trade of Jamaica,
Honourable Otinielu Tauteleimalae Tousi, Deputy Prime Minister of Tuvalu, Mr. Byron Blake, Assistant Secretary General of CARICOM, Excellencies, members of Governments,
Distinguished Participants, Colleagues, Ladies and Gentlemen,

It gives me great pleasure to be here with you in this superb setting and to welcome you to this Global Round Table UNDP is co-hosting with the Government of Jamaica on Vulnerability and Small Island Developing States. Let me take this opportunity to thank the Government of Jamaica represented here today by the Honourable Ben Clare, Minister of State, for their wonderful hospitality which we all appreciate. I wish to thank you all for attending this important event. Your high level of attendance is a good indication of the importance you attach to the issues we are discussing here during the Roundtable.

With less than four months left until the World Summit on Sustainable Development in Johannesburg and a mere two weeks before the last PrepCom in Bali, critical decisions need to be taken about the way we strategize, plan and implement activities to ensure positive outcomes for WSSD and secure a sustainable future for all.
It is time for commitments, actions and most of all -partnerships between committed actors who are prepared to put aside technical differences in order to promote the common objective of a better world through sustainable development.

SIDS countries, spanning the continents of Africa, Asia and the Caribbean in the Americas, are now in a position to present common regional and sub-regional strategies and type II initiatives to overcome the constraints of unique vulnerability faced by SIDS. These initiatives would ensure that the "performance contract" established in Monterrey between OECD and developing countries and the development agenda of Doha could be translated into action programmes in Johannesburg, and would be backed up by the additional financial resources required.
The excellent paper prepared by the University of the West Indies provides the technical and political recommendations for the SIDS/AOSIS to obtain the required results in Bali and subsequently at the Johannesburg Summit.

Our shared objective is no longer debatable nor is it questionable. It has in some ways been defined during the Millennium Summit in September 2000 and translated in the Millennium Development Goals which target eradicating extreme poverty and hunger, promoting universal primary education and gender equality, reducing child mortality, combating HIV/AIDS and other diseases and ensuring environmental sustainability. To achieve these Goals, global, regional and national partnerships are required among all stakeholders of development to speed up the implementation of Agenda 21 and work towards achieving the MDGs by 20 15.

We are faced with formidable challenges, which require substantial determination. But what we need most is increased capacity to address all the complex development issues. Capacity - whether it is financial, human or institutional -is by far the single most important component for the implementation of any global convention or conference. Supporting governments in building those capacities has been UNDP's 'bread and butter' since the Rio Conference in 1992.

The Rio Declaration recognized that "...the special situation and needs of developing countries, particularly the least developed and those most environmentally vulnerable, should be given special priorities."
In this context, Agenda 21 was translated into fifteen specific programmes, each representing a priority area relevant to addressing the unique sustainable development challenges faced by SIDS known as the SIDS Programme of Action.

In addition, and since the UN General Conference on SIDS in 1994, UNDP has been a major contributor to the agenda-shaping process in respect to reduction of Small Island vulnerability.

With modest resources and an ambitious agenda, UNDP has sought to strengthen national capacities of SIDS in the face of their versatile vulnerability. Through the Capacity 21 programme, UNDP has worked continuously with many of the Caribbean governments including Saint Lucia, Grenada, Dominica, British Virgin Islands, Barbados and -our gracious host today- Jamaica, to strengthen institutional capabilities and facilitate greater collaboration among stakeholders.

The Pacific Islands have also benefited from Capacity 21' s support. Papua New Guinea' s national programme, as well as the regional Pacific programme supported by UNDP, have been instrumental in building capacities of local communities in a selected number of Islands including the Cook Islands, Samoa, Vanuatu, Solomon Islands, Kiribati, and the Federated States of Micronesia.

Through other initiatives such as Technical Cooperation Among Developing Countries (TCDC), UNDP has helped to strengthen capacities of the Caribbean SIDS. Foremost among these was the production of a directory of SIDS' experts and institutions designed to facilitate the use of Caribbean-wide capacities in the Implementation of the Barbados Program of Action as well as a jointly sponsored Government of Singapore- TCDC programme for the training of Caribbean personnel in various fields.

The GEF Small Grants Programme has supported almost 300 projects in Trinidad & Tobago, Dominican Republic, Papua New Guinea, Mauritius and through its regional programme. The Small Grants Programme provides grants directly to local communities and NGOs to promote community action to address global environmental concerns while strengthening the capacities of local people to generate sustainable livelihoods.
During the recent sixth meeting of the Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biodiversity (COP 6), a specific reference to expand the GEF Small Grants Programme to additional developing countries, and especially SIDS, was incorporated into the COP decision on guidance for the financial mechanism of the Convention.

But more still needs to be done to address the special conditions of the Small Islands and their economic, social and ecological vulnerability. We are aware of the Small Islands' on-going and just effort for global recognition of their specific vulnerability and UNDP has traditionally been at the frontline in advocating preferential treatment.
More needs to be done because the reality Small Islands are faced with today is entirely different to that of the early 1990's. Globalization and the IT revolution have enormously changed our world and our communities. As much as these offer new opportunities, we also need to make sure that the most vulnerable countries are well-prepared to mitigate the adverse impact of these new phenomena.

Energy is essential to support growth and human well-being and the way energy is produced and consumed impacts all three aspects of vulnerability .All of the Millennium Development Goals, especially the poverty reduction goal, require greatly expanded availability of energy services, especially in developing countries. Energy issues must be squarely addressed at the Johannesburg Summit as a means to achieve the goals of Agenda 21.

Excellencies,
Distinguished Participants,

A month ago, I had the privilege to present during the plenary session of the Third WSSD PrepCom in New York the new and most important capacity development initiative UNDP is launching. The multi-partner Capacity 2015 platform of action is our response to the needs of developing countries as expressed by them in the course of the global preparatory process.

Many of you were present in Singapore at the WSSD Inter-regional preparatory meeting last January and have endorsed its declaration, which calls to (quote): "Accelerate national and regional implementation of the Barbados Program of Action", and requests that the international community (quote)"...Provide adequate financial resources, transfer of appropriate, environmentally sound technologies and assistance for capacity-building for such national and regional implementation, as agreed in Agenda 21".

I am pleased to say that -to a large extent -the Capacity 2015 platform will act in response to your plea, containing a special segment, which refers to the distinctive challenges and needs of the Small Islands. While these challenges are hardly new, UNDP is using the political momentum of WSSD to tackle some of them and we will need your strong support. We have decided to convene this roundtable because we want to hear from you -decision makers, policy advisors, members of NGOs, academics and media affiliates -how to take this initiative forward in an inclusive and consultative manner.

Our task here -which started yesterday with the technical session and will continue today with the ministerial level roundtable -is to identify key elements of economic, environmental and social vulnerability that SIDS should pursue in Johannesburg. This requires clear identifiable actions that will enable the mobilization of resources to attend to pressing needs.

Excellencies,
Distinguished participants,

We need to ensure that the SIDS' needs are reflected in the World Summit's agenda. Let us work together, so that by the time we leave here, we will have agreed on the process through which the Small Islands would benefit from our new and improved Capacity 2015 platform. UNDP is convinced the time is ripe to push forward for an inter-regional framework to combat vulnerability through a meaningful partnership involving governments, civil societies and the private sectors.

I am told that yesterday's technical deliberations around the various issues of vulnerability were productive and have already positioned us in an advanced stage, from which to proceed today and in the next few months. I am confident that today's discussions will take us even further towards reaching a consensus on this highly important partnership.

I wish us all a fruitful discussion and a successful roundtable and thank you all for participating.

I thank you.





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