| Overview : As a Party to the United Nations Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and the agreements thereunder, Trinidad and Tobago is committed to reducing its contribution to greenhouse gas (GHGs) emissions and the effects of climate change. The Convention is of particular importance to this highly industrialized, Small Island Developing State (SIDS) that faces adaptation challenges and is vulnerable to impacts such as increases in temperature, changes in precipitation, sea level rise, increased flooding, loss of coastal habitat and hillside erosion. In the context of the UNFCCC’s call for developed countries to support developing countries’ efforts to address GHG emissions in alignment with their development priorities, the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) Low Emission Capacity Building (LECB) Programme was launched in January 2011 as part of a joint collaboration with the European Union (EU), the German Federal Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conservation, Building and Nuclear Safety (BMUB) and the Government of Australia. This global programme supported twenty-five (25) countries, including Trinidad and Tobago, with: - Improving climate change mitigation actions through the development of Low Emission Development (LCD) Strategies and Nationally Appropriate Mitigation Actions (NAMAs).
- Strengthening systems for Monitoring, Reporting and Verification (MRV) and national GHG inventories.
- Supporting the development and attainment of Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) under the Paris Agreement, which entered into force on 4th November 2016.
The Government of the Republic of Trinidad and Tobago (GoRTT), through the Ministry of Planning and Development (MPD), and together with the UNDP, successfully coordinated a National LECB Project, focusing on the power generation, transport and industry sectors. This project commenced in July 2014 and was completed by December 2017. In January 2018, along with twenty-five (25) other pre-selected countries, Trinidad and Tobago transitioned into a second phase of the LECB Programme, now known as the UNDP NDC Support Programme. Building on the foundational work achieved by the LECB Programme, the UNDP, European Union and German and Spanish governments aim to support Governments to attain zero carbon development and transformational change through the implementation of NDC’s. |
