On March 24, the OPCC and the Environment and Natural Resources Ministry of the Dominican Republic held the workshop "Strengthening the Legal Framework Addressing Climate Change in the Dominican Republic." The workshop took place virtually and provided a space for dialogue and knowledge exchange to strengthen the country’s proposal for a Climate Change Framework Law as part of the technical assistance that the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC) granted to the Caribbean country to strengthen its climate change management actions. This was a valuable opportunity in which the Parliamentarian Observatory for Climate Change and Just Transition (OPCC) provided support for a country to develop a comprehensive and effective framework law on climate change.

The government of the Dominican Republic, through the Environment and Natural Resources Ministry (MMA-RD), has drafted a bill that seeks to reflect best practices in the subject and understand the implications for managing climate change in various productive sectors. The bill is comprehensive and considers key environmental and social-economic aspects of the country. The Vice-Minister of Climate Change and Sustainability of the Dominican Republic Milagros de Camps explained that enacting a climate change framework law in the country will establish a multi-level climate governance. The enactment of the framework law will allow for institutionalizing the goal of adaptation and carbon neutrality. Moreover, it will allow for government adjustments according to economic issues, technological advances, and international agreements. The legislation under development aims to give clear attributions to economic sectors and establish proper goals, climate change management instruments, as well as a financing strategy to address the climate crisis in the country.

The Observatory participants' extensive experience can serve as a resourceful contribution to legislation for a just transition to low-carbon economies and the advancement of climate ambition in Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC). In order to contribute to a successful legislative proposal in the Dominican Republic, three parliamentarians who are part of the OPCC engaged in the workshop. Those include Senator Ricardo Lagos, member of the Senate of Chile's Commission on Environment, Climate Change, and National Assets, Congressman Eduardo Enrique Murat Hinojosa, member of the Committees on Science, Technology and Innovation and Environment and Natural Resources of the Chamber of Deputies of Mexico, and Parliamentary Secretary Veronica Dorsette-Hector of Montserrat. Advisors and technical staff from other parliamentary offices were also present, representing OPCC participants from Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, and Mexico. Senator Ricardo Lagos and Congressman Eduardo Murat described the processes of how framework legislation was approved in their parliaments and detailed elements of these legal instruments. The technical staff also shared suggestions and made specific comments on the proposed bill, which were well received by the Vice-Minister Milagros de Camps.

During the workshop, the OPCC legislative database was presented, with a special focus on OPCC’s Legislative Tracker, available at https://opcc.cepal.org/en/tracker/general-overview. The OPCC’s Legislative Tracker is a transparent and free tool that provides a new way of looking at the state of legislation and parliamentary environmental treatment in the region, presenting indicators through interactive graphics, action panels, and comparable data in dashboard format. Bearing in mind the collaboration opportunity with the Dominican Republic, the usefulness of the Legislative Tracker was highlighted as it can help identify opportunities for legislative initiatives based on existing and proposed legal instruments in various countries in the LAC region.

In conclusion, the event represented a valuable opportunity for collaboration among lawmakers. It showcased the invaluable contributions of the OPCC to the Legislative Tracker as well as to providing a space for knowledge exchange to political authorities, legislators, researchers, and citizens of the Latin America and Caribbean region and beyond. The OPCC continues to work to fulfill its mission toward fostering a network of collaboration and inter-parliamentary cooperation in LAC, whose main objective is to build an agenda to strengthen the climate ambition and just transition in the region.