Press Release 5 March 2002

Press Release from the Guyana Delegation, CHOGM

Guyana's President Calls for Positive Action for Iwokrama's Future

In the midst of numerous interventions during the last executive session at the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM), the small island states of the Commonwealth called for positive support and action for sustainable development and against global warming. The Commonwealth's youngest head of state, Guyana's President Bharrat Jagdeo, made strong pleas for the Commonwealth States to reaffirm their support for an existing Commonwealth initiative: the Iwokrama International Centre for Rain Forest Conservation and Development. HRH the Prince of Wales became its patron in November 2000.

This Centre was set up in 1996 under an agreement between the Government of Guyana and the Commonwealth Secretariat, after Guyana designated 360,000 ha or 1 million acres of forest in the heart of Guyana for this purpose at the 1989 CHOGM in Malaysia.

The Centre received a large injection of funds from several donors, including the UK and Canada, during 1997-2000, and is now poised to begin generating significant income from the Iwokrama Forest that will help the Centre meet its mission to demonstrate how tropical rain forests can be conserved and sustainably used while making a significant contribution to both local and national economic development. This will contribute considerable understanding about how developing countries in and beyond the Commonwealth can better harness the potential of forests to contribute to sustainable and equitable development, lasting poverty reduction and the protection of vital local and global environmental services and values.

President Jagdeo lent his strong support to Tuvalu in its request for aid towards reducing the impacts of global warming and indicated that the Iwokrama Centre was a major player within the Commonwealth for related work. Further funding for the Centre will be needed for at least another three years, however, to bridge the transition to a significant level of financial sustainability. An endowment fund is being launched to ensure that the Centre can also pursue its role as an education and training centre in these fields. Continued moral and financial support from the Commonwealth and its Member Governments is essential to protect the achievements of the past few years and build for the future. With so much achieved so far, it would be tragic for Guyana, the Commonwealth, and the wider international community if the future of the Centre and its programmes was threatened by insufficient continuity of commitment at this crucial transition stage.