Two Bahamas National Trust (BNT) staff members recently traveled to Grenada to take part in the Conservation Leadership in the Caribbean (CLiC) programme to work on improving their skills in environmental leadership.
BNT Education Officer Scott Johnson and Science Officer Agnessa Lundy traveled to Grenada to take part in the programme and completed two weeks of training at St. Georges University on conservation in the Caribbean.
The CLiC programme is a multi-disciplinary programme that aims to strengthen the conservation capacity in the Caribbean.
Twenty participants from 13 countries in the Caribbean and Central and South America came up with five projects focusing on five major conservation issues faced in the Caribbean: wildlife trafficking, invasive species, endemic and endangered species, critical habitats, and critical threats.
“It has been a challenging yet rewarding two weeks in Grenada,” Johnson said. “I learned more about conservation than I ever did and was able to understand the amount of work it takes to plan long term projects to save our wildlife.”
Funded in part by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) and supported by the International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW; www.ifaw.org), CLiC is a prestigious opportunity for up-and-coming conservation professionals in the wider Caribbean to gain invaluable skills and experience working with proven conservation leaders.
“This was perhaps the most fulfilling moment of my conservation career – diving wholly and solely into the culture and lives of my new Caribbean colleagues, friends and CLiC fellows,” said Lundy, one of BNT’s newest team members. “Also, the five amazing projects we have decided to work on aims at enhancing biodiversity throughout the Caribbean and parts of Central and South America.”
This training event was the first of three sessions that will take place over the next two years, where Lundy and Johnson will join conservationists in designing, implementing and evaluating projects in conservation for the Caribbean.
Once they graduate from the programme, they will be conservation leaders in the Caribbean and their enhanced skills will help them to train young environmental leaders in conservation.
