The Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) has developed the Sustainable Islands Platform (SIsP) to promote sustainability among island territories through innovative development pathways under the following program pillars:
The goal of the Sustainable Islands Platform (SIsP) website is to serve as a resource for those re-thinking development approaches while creating an online community for those committed to creating more sustainable islands around the world.
Given the inherent vulnerability and challenges of islands, the platform emphasizes an “island systems approach” that focuses on achieving and showcasing sustainability while improving regional collaboration to address common challenges and opportunities.
Islands and their residents face challenges that limit their development options and make them highly vulnerable to climate change.
All of these characteristics make islands highly sensitive to external financial and economic shocks. Overcoming these challenges requires a paradigm shift from the perspective of islands as small, land-based economies to significant and essential ocean-based economies. Through this platform, we are encouraging island leaders to re-imagine integrated sustainability solutions that examine the linkages and interactions between their economies, societies, and the environment within the context of an oceanic development space.