If Jennifer Geerlings-Simons is President today, it’s the fruit of a long journey, marked by consistency, discretion and high standards. First elected to the National Assembly in 1996, she won the confidence of her peers through hard work and integrity. She remained in office for 24 years, including ten as President of the Assembly, becoming a figure of stability in a sometimes turbulent institutional environment.

But she has never presented herself as a woman of power. What drives her is the idea of service. During her investiture speech, she declared: “I learned to care before leading. My profession has taught me to respect life, not to judge, and to think long term.” These words sum up the way she approaches her new position: not as a summit to be conquered, but as a mission to be accomplished.

The Caribbean territories are participating fully in COP30, as members of the Framework Convention and representatives of the Small Island Developing States. They include Barbados, Trinidad and Tobago, Haiti, Saint Lucia, Jamaica, Cuba, Antigua and Barbuda, Dominica, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Grenada and Saint Vincent and the Grenadines.

Why is their presence essential? Because these countries, although low emitters of greenhouse gases, are bearing the full brunt of climate change: increasingly violent cyclones, rising sea levels, water stress, coastal erosion and the collapse of marine biodiversity.