The En­vi­ron­men­tal Man­age­ment Au­thor­i­ty (EMA) has re­ceived ac­cred­i­ta­tion from the Green Cli­mate Fund (GCF) as Trinidad and To­ba­go’s first Di­rect Ac­cess En­ti­ty (DAE).

The GCF Board ap­proved the ac­cred­i­ta­tion on Tues­day grant­i­ng the EMA di­rect ac­cess to in­ter­na­tion­al cli­mate fi­nance re­sources. Di­rec­tor of In­vest­ment Ser­vices at the Green Cli­mate Fund, Acha­la Abeysinghe, said the ac­cred­i­ta­tion strength­ens the Fund’s part­ner­ship with na­tion­al en­vi­ron­men­tal au­thor­i­ties and sup­ports greater coun­try own­er­ship of cli­mate ac­tion.

As an Ac­cred­it­ed En­ti­ty for projects val­ued up to USD 50 mil­lion, the EMA can now col­lab­o­rate with gov­ern­ment, pri­vate sec­tor, civ­il so­ci­ety, and re­gion­al or­gan­i­sa­tions on GCF-fund­ed cli­mate adap­ta­tion and mit­i­ga­tion ini­tia­tives.

The ac­cred­i­ta­tion en­hances the re­gion’s ca­pac­i­ty to mo­bilise cli­mate fi­nance and sup­ports Trinidad and To­ba­go’s com­mit­ment to the Paris Agree­ment and its Na­tion­al­ly De­ter­mined Con­tri­bu­tion to re­duce green­house gas emis­sions and im­prove cli­mate re­silience.

Min­is­ter of Plan­ning, Eco­nom­ic Af­fairs and De­vel­op­ment, Sen­a­tor the Ho­n­ourable Dr. Kennedy Swarats­ingh, com­mend­ed the EMA for achiev­ing ac­cred­i­ta­tion, stat­ing that it demon­strates the Au­thor­i­ty’s fi­nan­cial and en­vi­ron­men­tal man­age­ment ca­pac­i­ty and com­mit­ment to ad­vanc­ing na­tion­al and re­gion­al re­silience.

EMA Man­ag­ing Di­rec­tor, Hay­den Ro­mano, said the ac­cred­i­ta­tion aligns with the Sus­tain­able De­vel­op­ment Goals and the Na­tion­al En­vi­ron­men­tal Pol­i­cy. He said the EMA will be­gin stake­hold­er con­sul­ta­tions to de­vel­op project pro­pos­als and ex­pects to sub­mit the first project con­cepts to the GCF in ear­ly 2026.