Supporting biodiversity and climate resilience in the Caribbean
Darwin Plus is a government funding initiative to support the UK Overseas Territories. We currently have two of these projects running; one in the British Virgin Islands (BVI) and one in the Turks and Caicos Islands (TCI).
DPLUS129: Understanding Ramsar wetland dynamics for marine conservation and environmental resilience
In TCI, we’re helping to map and describe the amazing biodiversity of the Islands. The majority of the islands are covered by wetlands designated to be of international importance under the Ramsar Convention. We’re demonstrating how these wetlands support biodiversity, coastal protection, and natural capital and how future changes in climate could impact them. We are also developing a monitoring framework and building technical and scientific capacity in local staff, in order to help sustain wetland management in the long term.
DPLUS180: Integrating climate change resilience into protected area design and management
In BVI, we are looking at how climate change is already impacting the islands through more intensive storms and droughts, as seen by the 2017 hurricane season. We have created a climate change model specific to BVI which has demonstrated the importance of the National Parks for providing resilience for the whole island by providing many ecosystem services and supporting a rich biodiversity.
We have produced a range of maps and modelled data for both projects, and are looking to ensure the accuracy and validity of these through stakeholder engagement before producing the final outputs. To help with this, we gathered the brightest minds in ecology and climate science across the Caribbean Overseas Territories through two online technical symposiums – one each for BVI and TCI.
In these meetings, we discussed our work, the data we have collected, and the models we have generated. We received positive feedback and support from all the experts, and valuable insights which will help us improve the models even further. Stakeholders found the approaches transferable so we are sharing our data and outputs across all active Darwin Plus and other ongoing conservation projects in the UKOTs, for broader impact.
If you would like to find out more about the Darwin Plus projects Environment Systems are leading, please get in touch.