Preparations Advanced For Regional Energy Meeting Next February

Preparations are in high gear for Jamaica’s hosting of the fourth Ministerial Meeting for the Energy and Climate Partnership of the Americas (ECPA) on February 27 and 28, 2020.

Energy ministers from across the region are expected to converge at the Montego Bay Convention Centre in St. James for the two-day event, which will be chaired by Minister of Science, Energy and Technology, Hon. Fayval Williams, under the theme ‘Energy Resilience and Investment Opportunities’.

Speaking at the launch at the Courtyard by Marriott hotel in New Kingston on Wednesday (November 13), Minister Williams said that Jamaica and its partners in the Americas are well advanced in the planning for the Ministerial Meeting.

An Inter-Ministerial Planning Committee has been established to execute all logistics for the successful staging of the event.

Mrs. Williams said that participants will be engaged in robust discussions around several themes.

These include a national energy plan, governance and resilience, financial mechanism for clean and renewable energy, renewable energy and electric mobility, and strategies to increase private-sector engagement in energy infrastructure development.

In addition, several activities will be held on the margins of the meeting to improve dialogue around renewable energy, energy poverty, behavioural change affecting energy efficiency, research and innovation, electric mobility, efficient use of cleaner fossil fuels, and energy infrastructure.

A number of local awareness events have been planned to start discussions about Jamaica’s energy agenda and the role of government, the private sector and citizens in the pursuit of the transformation of the energy sector.

Mrs. Williams said that an important feature of the Ministerial will be a high-level private-sector forum led by the Americas Business Dialogue (ABD).

She noted that the ABD “has become an important fixture on the Ministerial agenda facilitating technical support and convening government authorities to explore public-private collaboration on energy in the Americas”.

Mrs. Williams said that the meeting will provide an opportunity to make an assessment of the first 10 years of the ECPA, which was created in April 2009, and to set the agenda for 2020 onwards.

“The framework provided by the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) provides cohesion and a supporting global imperative for the ECPA platform. ECPA members must see the fourth Ministerial Meeting as a call to deepen the collaborations, strengthen the networks, leverage our resources, scale up actions and sharpen our focus on creating a better tomorrow for this and future generations,” she said.

The ECPA is a hemispheric mechanism through which governments across the Americas can further action and address their countries’ needs with regard to energy security and sustainability.

Through the Partnership, the nations can learn from each other, share technology, foster investment, promote the development of markets for goods and services related to clean energy and maximise comparative advantages in order to build more sustainable and resilient communities.

A major objective is to achieve Goal #7 of the SDGs, which is aimed at ensuring access to affordable, reliable, sustainable and modern energy for all by 2030.