Project Name：St. Kitts and Nevis Enhancing Agricultural Adaptive Capacity to Climate Variability Project

Project status：Completed projects

Cooperating Country：Caribbean, St. Christopher (St. Kitts) and Nevis

Project Description：

A severe drought occurred in Saint Christopher and Nevis in 2015, in which the total crop output fell by 31.2 percent from the 2014 figure, affecting national food security and farmers’ livelihoods. In response, the country filed a request for assistance from Taiwan. Literature reviews and fieldwork confirmed that the impact of climate variability and climate change trends are important issues in St. Kitts’ agricultural development. Initial estimates of St. Kitts’ agricultural vulnerability revealed the core problem to be the lack of capacity of the country’s agricultural sector to respond and adapt to early warning information on climate variability, and that three measures should be adopted to increase the resilience of its agricultural system: establish a data collection mechanism for early warnings; develop and/or introduce crop disaster mitigation and prevention techniques; and increase the availability of agricultural information. When the project is completed, St. Kitts’ agricultural agencies will establish an information dissemination mechanism for crop disaster mitigation and prevention so that farmers can make use of the available information to minimize damage caused by disasters. This project will increase Taiwan’s efforts and contributions toward adapting to global climate change, implementing Article 11 of the Paris Agreement regarding capacity-building, in which signatory countries are to help “countries with the least capacity, such as the least developed countries, and those that are particularly vulnerable to the adverse effects of climate change... to take effective climate change action, including, inter alia, to implement adaptation and mitigation actions, and should facilitate technology development, dissemination and deployment, access to climate finance, relevant aspects of education, training and public awareness,” which would increase Taiwan’s international participation.

To watch the video made by the TaiwanICDF: St. Kitts and Nevis Enhancing Agricultural Adaptive Capacity to Climate Variability Project

Implementation Start Date：2018-02-27

Implementation End Date：2022-12-31

Project Objectives：St. Kitts’ agriculture sector will possess the warning information and adaptive capacity to respond to climate variability. At the project’s completion, agricultural agencies will establish an information dissemination mechanism for crop disaster mitigation and prevention, which farmers can use to minimize damage from disasters.

Executing Agency：

Taiwan Technical Mission in Saint Kitts and Nevis / Ministry of Agriculture of St. Kitts and Nevis 

Current Progress：

To the end of December 2022, the following activities have been completed:
1. Set up 4 agricultural weather stations in the most needed areas with expertise from the Council of Agriculture (COA), Executive Yuan, and the Central Weather Bureau (CWB) and initiated real-time data collection (http://www.agromet.kn/).
2. Arranged for 3 officials of cooperating units to come to the Central Weather Bureau to undertake technical training in basic weather forecasting and reporting.
3. Dispatched 2 Taiwanese experts to St. Kitts and Nevis to conduct technical consultation and capacity building.
4. Established 1 model farm and 4 model field for demonstration to farmers, undertook 11 crop cultivation trials and disease and pest monitoring in response to extreme weather conditions, and issued one annual report on crop disaster mitigation and prevention techniques.
5. Delivering on-site capacity building for officials of cooperating units and completed 4 SOP manuals (weather station maintenance, on-site data collection, digital image processing and soil fertility evaluation).
6. Develop social media group and made 96 announcements on crop disaster mitigation and prevention.
7. Conducted 26 events to teach farmers how to make use of agricultural information.

8. Conducted 8 events to teach farmers how to make use of climate-resistance cultivation skill.
9. Established 1 agricultural information platform (https://goo.gl/gpmExX), and compiled annual report on agricultural information dissemination.

10. Produced 1 "Suitable Crop Cultivation Map" and 1 "Annual Climate Risk Calendar in St. Kitts and Nevis".

Project Contact：Yu-Hsien Yeh

Phone：+886228886133

E-mail：y.y.hsien@icdf.org.tw

Projected Benefits：

1. Establish a mechanism for gathering early warning information. Such early warning information covers three major categories: weather as it pertains to agriculture, disaster potentials, and conditions that can cause crop disasters. Integrate Outputs #2 and #3 of the project, regularly hold events to increase awareness in climate change response, promote adaptive behaviors, and provide early warnings and concrete response plans prior to disaster, thereby attaining the goal of disaster mitigation and prevention.
2. Develop and/or introduce crop disaster mitigation and prevention techniques: In model farms and farmers’ demo fields, we will simulate agricultural disasters as cultivation experiments, with the goal of increasing crop resistance and reducing crop vulnerability. To lower costs and facilitate construction, we will introduce relevant Taiwanese varieties, cultivation management methods, materials and equipment, and lastly organize the test results into operating procedures and technical recommendations suitable for St. Kitts.
3. Increase the availability of agricultural information. Two strategies—integration of static information and dissemination of dynamic early warning information—will help Kittitian agricultural administration agencies and farmers obtain and make use of needed agricultural information in a timely fashion.

Mission：Taiwan Technical Mission in Saint Kitts and Nevis