The UWI Cave Hill Campus Annual Report to Council 2021/2022

Principal’s Overview | 45

The Mandate of the Barbados Environmental Sustainability Fund

transaction with the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) and the TNC as major partners. This arrangement makes provision for funding to be directed to the BESF. There are three Founding Members and eight ordinary members. The University of the West Indies, Cave Hill Campus, represented by the Centre for Resource Management and Environmental Studies (CERMES) is honoured to have been invited to be one of the Founding Members of the BESF, and is represented on the Board of Directors by Dr Janice Cumberbatch who was appointed as the Deputy Chair. The overarching goal of BESF is to promote the maintenance and growth of Barbados’ natural capital by making grants to non-profit organisations, community-based organisations, government agencies and the private sector for relevant environmental and sustainable projects. It is governed by a Board of Directors comprising seven non-governmental organisations and four governmental organisations. The structure of the BESF is displayed in Figure 2.

The BESF will operate as a Conservation Trust Fund that will raise funds from a combination of investors and/or grantors and use them to provide organisations with the resources needed to implement and manage on-the-ground conser- vation projects such as protection of wildlife, establishment or expansion of protected areas, support for sustainable livelihoods, and climate change adaptation and mitigation actions. One of the first grants that will be reviewed by the BESF will be to support the preparation of a Marine Spatial Plan (MSP) for Barbados. Support for the MSP was a critical condition of the Debt Conversion Transaction. The Campus, through CERMES, looks forward to advancing national environmental goals in Barbados. The BESF will provide significant support as Barbados seeks to achieve critical environmental milestones, including becoming fully fossil-fuel free, and implementing its first marine spatial plan.

Figure 2: Structure of the BESF

THE UNIVERSITY OF THE WEST INDIES CAVE HILL CAMPUS ANNUAL REPORT TO COUNCIL 2021/2022

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