From Hurricanes Irma to Jose to Maria, an active Atlantic storm season has ravaged wide swaths of the Caribbean.
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In studio with me at the United Nations is Gaston Browne, Prime Minister of Antigua and Barbuda. Prime Minister, thank you for being with us and welcome to Wake.
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Luke Vargas:
Finally, Mr. Prime Minister, I know your nation is still dealing with the immediate aftermath of these storms, and it will be difficult plain and simple to find money for a rebuilding effort. But as you look toward that, is the plan to rebuild as much as possible as quickly as possible, or is a storm like this a moment, an opportunity to begin to re-imagine and re-engineer your country for the future? Is this something you think this is an opportunity to discuss?
Gaston Browne:
Absolutely. Both. Clearly it’s an opportunity to recalibrate the way we do things, to ensure that going forward that we build a climate-resilient and certainly a green Barbuda.
The intent now is to ensure that Barbuda becomes a totally green island and we have made significant progress in that regard. We’ve had a grant of a few million dollars, so far, from the U.A.E., and I’m pretty sure that this is one such opportunity that we’ll be able to exploit and to implement to ensure that we have a green Barbuda, one in which we will reduce our carbon footprint, and one in which we will build a more resilient Barbuda going forward.
And clearly the opportunities to build a more resilient infrastructure, to probably put the electric lines underground, to have concrete homes, possibly homes that are built on pylons that go into the bedrock, properties that are elevated maybe two, three feet above the ground and properties that at the same time may have concrete roofs so we can sustain stronger winds, which will evidently be the norm unless we get greater responsibility from the developed countries, unless they will take responsibility to reduce their carbon footprint, to understand that ultimately their profligate use of fossil fuel is actually hurting other countries.
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