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A Commonwealth conference to strengthen small states’ access to disaster finance and help build their resilience against external shocks, has started in Samoa today.

Officials from small states have completed specially-designed training aimed at strengthening their skills in disaster risk financing. The two-day session in Samoa on disaster finance and disaster risk management was the first such activity delivered by the Commonwealth in partnership with the World Bank.

Small states in the Commonwealth are ideally placed to benefit from the development of solutions which reduce the devastating impact of natural disasters, according to the Secretary-General Patricia Scotland.

More than 500 representatives from governments, non-profits and global conglomerates joined forces to accelerate resilience building in Caribbean countries still recovering from hurricane devastation.

During the last leg of negotiations at the UN Climate Change Conference (COP24) this week in Poland, the Prime Minister of Tuvalu – an island nation of about 11,000 people located in the South Pacific acutely threatened by climate change – has called on the Commonwealth to leverage its 53-strong membership for climate action.

New research argues that the world’s poorest countries need to change their approach to entrepreneurship, if they want businesses to boost sustainable development. 

The small states of the Commonwealth could be losing out on $4.5 billion of overseas development assistance, a preliminary ������ study has shown.

Caribbean countries of the Commonwealth met in Georgetown, Guyana this week to deliberate on how to respond to major shifts in the global trade landscape.

Senior officials from Commonwealth small states have benefited from a roundtable human rights briefing, aimed at improving their ability to constructively engage with the international human rights system.

The Government of Seychelles in collaboration with the Commonwealth has launched the ‘Blue Economy Strategic Framework and Roadmap’ to build its ocean-based economy.

Mutual co-operation and respect for the rule of law received unanimous backing at the Meeting of Law Ministers and Attorneys General of Small Commonwealth Jurisdictions that has concluded in London.

The Commonwealth Small States Trade Finance Facility has become operational. Its supervisory board met for the first time today, in Malta. The Facility can now begin work to increase trade and investment flows for the 31 small states of the Commonwealth.

Commonwealth Secretary-General, Patricia Scotland, has recommended that small member countries put legal measures in place to prepare for the impacts of climate change.

The ‘Ask The Expert’ series features leading specialists who work at the ������ in specialised areas. In this fourth edition, Travis Mitchell, Head of Economic Policy and Small States, talks about the priority areas that will be discussed at this year’s Commonwealth Finance Ministers Meeting.

Pacific leaders have urged the ������ to ‘reshape and extend’ the Hub and Spokes programme beyond its proposed closure in November 2018.

The Commonwealth Secretary-General Patricia Scotland is in Nauru to meet leaders and other partners this week at the 49th Pacific Islands Forum (PIF) meeting.

The Least Developed Countries (LDCs) are an internationally defined group of highly vulnerable and structurally constrained economies with extreme levels of poverty.

It is hard to imagine that only 14 years ago Sri Lanka was severely devastated by the tsunami, triggered by a 9.0 magnitude earthquake in the Indian Ocean.

Commonwealth Secretary-General Patricia Scotland has met the Prime Minister of Sri Lanka, Ranil Wickremesinghe, during her first official visit to the country.

Recent research by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) has brought to light the significant macroeconomic impact of citizenship by investment programmes on many small states.

The Commonwealth’s hub for climate finance celebrated key milestones this week, including the mobilisation of £3.7 million for climate-vulnerable countries, with another £135 million in the pipeline.

The Republic of Mauritius will share valuable marine protection know-how with other Commonwealth countries, using the Commonwealth Blue Charter as a platform to exchange best practices, collaborate on research, and carry out training workshops.

Officials from Commonwealth small states have completed a specially-designed course to strengthen their negotiation skills in international decision-making forums.

Secretary-General Patricia Scotland will pay her first official visit to the island nation of Seychelles this week, signalling the Commonwealth’s continued interest in being a voice for small states. She will meet the Seychelles President Danny Faure, Vice-President Vincent Meriton, the speaker of the National Assembly, government ministers and parliamentarians to discuss ways to deepen cooperation.