The Unit­ed Na­tions Chil­dren’s Fund (UNICEF) and the Caribbean Com­mu­ni­ty Cli­mate Change Cen­tre (CC­C­CC) have signed a five-year Mem­o­ran­dum of Un­der­stand­ing (MoU) aimed at strength­en­ing cli­mate ac­tion that pri­ori­tis­es the rights and well-be­ing of chil­dren across the Caribbean.

The agree­ment, signed in Bel­mopan, Be­lize, es­tab­lish­es a frame­work for col­lab­o­ra­tion on child-sen­si­tive cli­mate poli­cies, cli­mate adap­ta­tion, dis­as­ter risk re­duc­tion and re­silient so­cial ser­vices, while al­so in­creas­ing op­por­tu­ni­ties for young peo­ple to par­tic­i­pate in cli­mate de­ci­sion-mak­ing.

The part­ner­ship comes as Caribbean coun­tries con­tin­ue to face in­creas­ing­ly se­vere hur­ri­canes, flood­ing, droughts, ex­treme heat and en­vi­ron­men­tal degra­da­tion, all of which threat­en chil­dren’s ac­cess to ed­u­ca­tion, health­care, safe wa­ter, san­i­ta­tion, nu­tri­tion and pro­tec­tion ser­vices.