Caribbean Development Bank (CDB), President, Dr. Warren Smith, has praised donors to the Caribbean Catastrophe Risk Insurance Facility (CCRIF) for the important role they are playing in the pioneering agency. Dr. Smith, who was speaking at opening of a strategic Donor Meeting in support of the CCRIF, said the role of the donor community with respect to the Facility cannot be understated. "You, the donors of the Region, have played a key and fundamental role in helping this unique organisation - the first multi-country risk pool in the world - to meet its key objective of helping to mitigate the short-term cash flow problems small developing economies suffer after major natural disasters," Dr. Smith said. The CDB President noted that the need for short-term liquidity to maintain essential government services until additional resources become available is critical. "CCRIF continues to represent a cost-effective way to pre-finance short-term liquidity to begin recovery efforts for an individual government after a catastrophic event, thereby filling the gap between immediate response aid and long-term redevelopment. "A great example of this was the USD8 million pay-out made to Haiti within 14 days after the devastating 2010 earthquake - this pay-out enabled the Haitian public sector and emergency services to continue to function in the months afterwards. This pay-out came before any other donor support to Haiti," he said. Dr. Smith lauded the CCRIF for meeting its main development objective, and for continuously supplying tools to the Region for enhanced disaster risk management (DRM). Its ability to bring new products to the table and continuously forge partnerships with key Regional organisations towards strengthening the capacity in DRM and climate change adaptation, as well as finding solutions to enable the Region to strengthen its resilience and move onto the path of sustainable prosperity were also commended. CCRIF was developed through funding from the Japanese Government, and was capitalised through contributions to a multi-donor Trust Fund by the Government of Canada, the European Union, the World Bank, the governments of the United Kingdom and France, CDB and the Governments of Ireland and Bermuda, as well as through membership fees paid by participating Governments.