UWI Vice-Chancellor and Prime Minister Mottley share perspectives on The Bridgetown Initiative

Release – The University of the West Indies will host a virtual Vice-Chancellor’s Forum on The Bridgetown Initiative this Thursday, March 30, 2023, from 12:00 pm (Eastern Caribbean/Eastern Daylight) and 11:00 am (Jamaica) via UWItv. 

The Bridgetown Initiative aims to overcome some of the main shortcomings of climate finance mobilization for small island developing states (SIDS). This is proposed to be accomplished through a bold plan to reform global finance architecture in favour of climate-vulnerable countries, particularly addressing how rich countries help poor countries cope with and adapt to climate change. The initiative was devised by a group led by Barbadian Prime Minister, The Honourable Mia Mottley and her climate finance Envoy Professor Avinash Persaud, who will both speak at the Vice-Chancellor’s Forum.

Vice-Chancellor Professor Sir Hilary Beckles, who has convened a panel of important voices for the Forum said “Prime Minister Mottley has launched a campaign in the global space which confronts the reality that the international financial system is not fit for purpose in the context of post-colonial relations. This system still cannot be credited with promoting the development of the countries like those in the Caribbean, which 60 years ago were not represented at the table. I concur with Prime Minister Mottley’s analysis; the rubber has hit the road and we have been left to deal with problems we did not create. It is wrong and unethical that we must fund our survival with debt. We must simultaneously stimulate economic and social development while confronting catastrophes like the climate crisis. She has so brilliantly articulated within the global financing setting the very thesis of How Britain Underdeveloped the Caribbean.” 

In addition to Prime Minister Mottley and Professor Persaud, the panel will be joined by Ambassador Malgorzata Wasilewska, Head, The European Union Delegation to Barbados, the OECS and CARICOM/CARIFORUM and Mr Kevin Bender, Director Greening Sovereign Debt, The Nature Conservancy. 

“This is the conversation; there must be a new set of financial institutions and rules fitter for purpose and more democratic. The UWI stands fully in support of the Bridgetown Initiative and lends its voice to the call to embrace the concept.” Vice-Chancellor Beckles added. 

Topics to be covered at the Forum include Climate Crisis and Funding Challenges; The Bridgetown Initiative – What and Why; The Bridgetown Initiative and its Role in Multilateral Cooperation in Financing Climate Adaptation; and The Bridgetown Initiative and its Role in Financing Climate Adaptation. 

Moderator of the Vice-Chancellor’s Forum, Professor C. Justin Robinson, Professor of Finance and Pro Vice-Chancellor Board for Undergraduate Studies, The UWI notes “The Bridgetown Initiative is arguably the most significant global policy initiative to originate from the Caribbean.” Named for the capital city of Barbados, its country of origin, the idea for the Bridgetown Initiative was first unveiled at COP26 Glasgow and has earned public praise from figures such as French President Emmanuel Macron and IMF managing director Kristalina Georgieva. 

The Forum will be streamed via all UWItv platforms; www.uwitv.org or www.facebook.com/UWItv and will close with a Q&A session with panellists.