The extractive sector in the Caribbean region will benefit from a Cdn$20 million fund being made available by the Canadian Extractive Sector Facility (CANEF) to help implement best practices in the management of natural resources linked to extractive industries.
The Fund, which is to be administered by the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) could have significant implications for the extractive sector in Guyana, where the Canadian government and that country’s mining sector has already been providing various forms of technical assistance. Canada has had a long history of association with the minerals sector in Guyana primarily through the links between the local bauxite industry and the Canadian conglomerate ALCAN. More recently, large scale Canadian investment in the country’s gold mining industry coupled with bilateral engagements on Canadian technical assistance to Guyana in the various facets of the oil and gas sector have pointed to even closer collaboration in the energy sector as a whole.
The IDB says that the funding being provided by the Canadian government is intended to support knowledge generation activities and technical assistance throughout Latin America and the Caribbean. It says that specialists from the bank will pursue initiatives aimed at identifying and putting in place best practices relating to the management of natural resources from the extractive sector, with particular attention to the implementation of environmental and social safeguards.
The Government of Guyana including current Minister of Natural Resources and the Environment Raphael Trotman is already on record as saying that it wants to raise awareness of the importance of applying enhanced environmental practices in the extractive industries. Over the years challenges have been faced, particularly in the gold-mining industry in relation to environmentally harmful mining practices including the profligate use of mercury and the despoliation of Amerindian communities. In the forestry sector, there has been the pursuit of unsustainable harvesting practices.
Commenting on the initiative by the Canadian Government, the country’s Executive Director at the IDB Guillermo Enrique Rishchynski said that Canada “has long been a key partner of the IDB in its activities in the extractive sector in particular. Canada and countries in Latin America and the Caribbean share the conviction that natural resources can help boost inclusive economic growth in the long term when the sector is handled with transparency, openness and efficiency.”
The project, the IDB says, is concerned with “generating regional public goods that promote long-term prospects, responsible investment and good relations between actors in the sector.” Part of its objectives is to seek to address technical challenges being faced by beneficiary countries and to facilitate exchange of knowledge and technologies. CANEF will also support technical assistance efforts in at least three countries to contribute to strengthening the governance of natural resources by improving regulatory and institutional frameworks and improving infrastructure information management.
IDB Project Team Leader Roman Espinosa says given the fact that the extractive sector is the backbone of the economies of several countries in the region the project “reflects our commitment to finding innovative solutions that improve the investment climate and economic, social and environmental sustainability of the extractive sector in Latin America and the Caribbean.”
