Enhancing Strategic Climate Literacy and Climate-Informed Management to Empower Communities: Insights from the Climate-Smart Caribbean Project

Challenges associated with climate change are motivating numerous efforts aimed at enhancing climate literacy and implementing solutions for climate adaptation. However, the extent to which these efforts result in behavioral changes, increased climate knowledge, and land management changes that lead to adaptation is unclear. The USDA Caribbean Climate Hub leads a collaborative project designed to help agricultural advisors, producers, and rural communities learn about climate change tendencies and support climate-informed planning actions. The “Climate-Smart Caribbean” project integrates the Caribbean Climate Hub, Agricultural Extension, and NGOs to increase climate literacy and preparedness among farmers, land managers, educators, and USDA agencies in Puerto Rico and the USVI. We hope that through these strengthened collaborations and stronger partnerships, the region’s ability to build climate change resilience, reduce vulnerability to extreme events, and assist in mitigation efforts will be enhanced. The effectiveness of these initiatives are assessed by examining participant’s evaluations and outlining the progress of some case studies. Finally, we describe recommended practices based on the experience drawn from farmer-to-farmer presentations on applied climate-smart management and planning. Overall, participants' response to the comprehensive initiative has been positive, with over 70% of the attendees expressing intent to apply gained knowledge in their work areas.