Suva, March 5, 2012: Supporting community empowerment and enabling community based organisations and NGOs to guide activities that conserve and restore the environment while enhancing their well-being and livelihoods is the very essence of sustainable development.

This was the message given this week by Dr Delfin Ganapin, Global Manager of the Global Environment Facility’s Small Grant Programme (GEF SGP) at a signing of a joint communiqué to officially launch a partnership between GEF SGP and the GEF supported Pacific Integrated Water Resources Management Project (Pacific IWRM).

The partnership aims to strengthen community involvement in integrated water resource management in the Pacific to improve implementation of “Community to Cabinet” approaches to water and wastewater management from “Ridge to Reef” and thereby also improve community resilience and environmental outcomes for many small islands.