Prime Minister Mia Amor Mottley is taking the Bridgetown Initiative to global leaders over the next two weeks, to negotiate better terms for climate financing for Barbados and its Caribbean counterparts.
Speaking at the end of a tour with Executive Vice President of the European Commission, Frans Timmermans, Ms. Mottley said Government was fighting, through the Bridgetown Initiative, to have a new deal with respect to how the country can access money and build in a more resilient way.
“For every dollar we spend now, we save $7 in spending if we were hit or damaged in a climate crisis,” she said, ahead of a two-week travel, where she is expected to put her case before global leaders.
Ms. Mottley stated that the Bridgetown Initiative was about securing a new financing deal, not just for Barbados, but for the world, whether it was increasing the capital of the World Bank, and other regional development banks.
She added that a number of countries were presently looking at natural disaster clauses, so that in the event of a climatic crisis, they could pause repaying their debt for two years, without affecting the credit rating or credit worthiness.
“That space you get in Barbados’ case is the equivalent of $2 billion. When we [are] talking about getting these clauses accepted, it is not a little bit of money we [are] talking about.
“We got the natural disaster clauses embedded in our commercial instruments when we restructured our debt. Barbados is the largest issuer of commercial paper in the world with natural disaster clauses. The fact that others will now be seeking to follow us, is an example of how we have been able to lead in this respect,” the Prime Minister said.
Ms. Mottley expressed the view that there was a need for multilateral development banks, regional development banks, the Inter-American Development Bank, the World Bank, and the Caribbean Development Bank, to also place natural disaster clauses in their debt instruments.
“So, instead of us only benefitting to $2 billion because of the clauses in our commercial paper, we can benefit more when it becomes accepted across the multilateral development banks,” she pointed out.
However, the Prime Minister said it was also important to get the world to mobilise $1.5 trillion in private sector investment across the globe to stop the planet from reaching 1.5 degrees.
Meanwhile, Mr. Timmermans noted the dynamic nature of negotiations about the climate and biodiversity crisis, and stated that the Bridgetown Initiative opened debate on where global financing should be going in the future.
The Executive Vice President said “massive amounts of money” was needed to address the industrial revolution, climate crisis and some of the results of the COVID-19 pandemic.
“If we need massive amounts of investment, it can never be only public money. We would have to unleash the potential of trillions of private investment,” he stated.
He also called for countries to act swiftly, saying the longer the climate crisis took, the more difficult and costlier it would become to fight it.
“Speed is of the essence; speed of investment [and] speed in having a leverage effect on the investment are more important than sticking to the rules of the investment,” he outlined, noting that the Bridgetown Initiative provided that opportunity.
During the tour, Prime Minister Mottley, Mr. Timmermans and a delegation visited the Bridgetown Fisheries Complex, Six Men’s, the HOPE Project at Lancaster, and the Walkers Reserve. It concluded with a press conference at the Zemi Café Community Centre at Hillcrest, Bathsheba.