BRACCCVAS Inception Workshop

The Building Resilience for Adaptation to Climate Change and Climate Variability in Agriculture in Saint Lucia (BRACCVAS) project is actively addressing the escalating vulnerabilities in the agriculture sector through an ongoing analysis aimed at mapping challenges across the Saint Lucia. This initiative seeks to enhance resilience and effectively combat climate change, with a specific focus on Geographic Information Services within the agriculture sector.

 The Building Resilience for Adaptation to Climate Change and Climate Variability in Agriculture in Saint Lucia (BRACCCVAS Project), officially began operations in early 2023, with a primary objective of fortifying resilience in Saint Lucia’s Agricultural Sector for livelihood security through the enhancement of adaptive capacities for climate change and vulnerabilities.

The designated Vulnerability Analysis (VA) Consultant for the project, Dr. Shawn Charles is currently undertaking a weeklong visit to Saint Lucia to establish a collaborative framework and seamlessly integrate his professional expertise into the ongoing initiatives of the BRACCCVAS Project. An Inception Workshop was conducted, focusing on Geographic Information Systems (GIS). Engaging stakeholders responsible for spatial data management on the vulnerabilities that exists within the agriculture sector, Dr. Shawn Charles conducted diagnostic tests to evaluate their current capacity levels. He says the aim is to compile data from all stakeholders into a unified database, facilitating an analysis to prioritize sites.

“Farming now has deferred over the past twenty, thirty years as we have noticed and, we need to find creative ways to reduce the negative consequences both from extreme weather conditions and form pest and disease control. We have quite a bit of animals here that destroy our crops and we need to come up with some strategies to deal with them all in the name of building resilience, not just getting rid of but being able to promote sustainable agriculture for the next thirty, forty, fifty years. ”

Targeting Agricultural Regions 1&2, 6, and 7 in the Northern, West, and South-West parts, the project addresses issues such as steep slopes, landslips, water shortages, poor drainage, salt intrusion, low production capacity, and weak competitiveness in domestic supply chains.

Project Manager of the BRACCVAS Project, Dr. Donatien Guatave explains that this intervention will result in the creation of updated vulnerability maps, providing a crucial resource for the BRACCCVAS Project to address capacity development in response to climate change.

 “The data initially collected last year, is going to be incorporated into a GIS database. With that database, it is going to specify vulnerbailtiies in saint lucia, specifically those relating to farmers and the operation of agro processors. Ultimately the aim is to understand the vulnerabilities that can be deployed to enhance adaptive capacities of the stakeholders, not only farmers and agroprocessors but also the Ministry of Agriculture and other key governmental and non-governmental agencies”

Following this assessment, the BRACCCVAS Project plans to organize training exercises designed to elevate the capacities of stakeholders with a goal of ensuring sustained capacity building in Saint Lucia.