King Charles III, the Commonwealth back Guyana’s biodiversity agenda

…as UK ready to lend expertise

President Dr Irfaan Ali is in the United Kingdom for a series of high-level engagements focused on Guyana’s work in climate, environmental protection and biodiversity.

At the conclusion of his first day of meetings, King Charles III and the Commonwealth commended Guyana’s progress and pledged continued support particularly for its Global Biodiversity Alliance (GBA).
The Guyanese leader first met with King Charles on Tuesday at Buckingham Palace, where they engaged in discussions on ongoing collaborations in the areas of environmental protection, biodiversity, and climate action.
In a live broadcast following the engagement, President Ali noted that King Charles has recommitted his support to Guyana.
“He is not only an onlooker in what we’re doing but he is an active participant and a promoter of the work Guyana is doing in terms of climate, environment, forestry and now biodiversity,” the President noted.
The Head of State went on to add, “So, we had a very good engagement. King Charles has recommitted his support to Guyana, lauded the work that we’re doing, and we came up, of course, with the priorities in these areas, that we will pursue and I exchanged ideas of how best we can bring financing, we can look at a biodiversity model that is market-based… And importantly, one in which we can build an ecosystem around,” he outlined.
As Guyana positions itself as a major player in biodiversity and ecological services, President Ali said the Commonwealth has similarly reaffirmed its support for the country’s efforts.
Among the officials accompanying the Guyanese leader in these engagements are Local Government and Regional Development Minister Priya Manickchand and Presidential advisor on climate change and biodiversity Shyam Nokta; Advisor to the Office of the President Kevin Hogan and High Commissioner Raj Singh.
On Tuesday, he also engaged with the Commonwealth Secretary-General, Shirley Ayorkor Botchwey, and a key outcome from that engagement is an agreement to collaborate on strategic initiatives to support the Global Biodiversity Alliance. A Joint Working Team will advance efforts to establish an International Biodiversity Centre of Excellence based in Guyana.
According to the Guyanese Leader, it is important “…to have that centre operationalised very quickly, but integrated with other centres around the world. This is important in a world where we’ve already lost 60 per cent of our biodiversity.”

Lending expertise
These engagements come on the heels of outgoing British High Commissioner to Guyana, Jane Miller, announcing last week that the United Kingdom will be joining the Global Biodiversity Alliance – an initiative crafted by President Ali that seeks to accelerate international financing and technical expertise to conserve the world’s biodiversity resources.
In a subsequent interview with the Guyana Times, High Commissioner Miller said the Biodiversity Alliance is an exciting collaboration that will bring together the private sector, international organisations, countries, individuals, philanthropists, and more.
“[There will be] a whole range of people all passionate about ending biodiversity loss, and reversing the changes that we’re seeing across the world and to find interesting ways, and incentives that would enable that to happen, whether that be debt swaps or biodiversity bonds or biodiversity credits. And I think the beauty for me is that it’s an innovative group. It’s a group of people that are all individually passionate about this,” she posited.
The British Diplomat, who has ended a four-tenure in the Guyana, explained to this newspaper that the UK, in particular, is very passionate about this agenda and is hoping to share its vast expertise in advancing the work of the Alliance.
“We’ll just bring some other ideas to the table. We have experts within some of our government departments in the UK that have been working for some time looking at biodiversity and looking at biodiversity loss around the world. It includes academic institutions as well as government departments. So, bringing that expertise and bringing also financing mechanisms, understanding how different incentives can change people’s behaviour. So, I think it’s going to be a mixture of academics and policy people to really sort of add to the table, add to the conversation,” Miller stated.
Meanwhile, President Ali has already welcomed the UK’s decision to join the Alliance.
Launched last year by the Guyanese Leader, the Global Biodiversity Alliance is an initiative aims at strengthening collective action in protecting the planet’s rich biodiversity and advancing sustainable development.
Stemming from the inaugural Global Biodiversity Alliance Summit held in Georgetown in July 2025, the GBA Secretariat will be set up in Guyana and will work with key stakeholders to advance its priorities, which include the designation of new protected areas and securing the necessary funding and resources for managing them effectively.
At the end of last year’s summit, 14 countries had joined the Alliance as founding members and agreed on a concrete action plan. President Ali had committed to further growing the membership ahead of the second summit this year.