Peak Investments Hosts 4 Day Training in Sustainable Financing in Marine Protected Areas

Peak Investments in collaboration with the German Development Agency, Doitshe Gesellshaft International through its Sustainable Marine Financing Program in the OECS, hosted a 4-day training workshop in Sustainable Financing in Marine Protected Areas MPA’s.

The aim was to develop practical steps to the operationalizing of a sustainable financial mechanism with the main objectives of introducing participants to practical hands-on approaches, techniques and principles of marine financing, financial planning, improving the skills of managers, and provide guidance on potential sources of funding which may supplement current funding mechanisms.

Training Specialist Taletha Laudat says the knowledge gained is expected to enable participating agents of MPAs to tap into and capitalize on emerging opportunities and to take practical steps to diversify income streams.

She says this practical training workshop focused on how to set up and operationalize a sustainable financing mechanism for an MPA and highlighted the importance of sustainable financial mechanisms as the basis for marine resource conservation.

The Sustainable Marine Financing Programme supported the development of requisite skills to enable successful implementation of non-traditional financing mechanisms for MPA management.

Additionally, facilitators reminded MPA managers that emphasis needs to be placed on the realization of climatic assessments to collect data, the need for the identification of risks, selection of the most appropriate risk treatments and greening of their financial planning as steps to the development of their sustainable financial mechanism.