Wednesday December 8, 2010…./ The Prime Minister the Honourable Bruce Golding officially opened the 5th Annual Caribbean Disaster Management Conference at the Opening Ceremony held yesterday, Tuesday December 7, 2010 at the Rose Hall Resort and Spa in Montego Bay.
Prime Minister Golding who was also the Key Note Speaker at the event commended the conference organizers for the focus on climate change and its impact on disasters. He lamented that a global consensus for climate change was not arrived at in Copenhagen and underscored the need for rapid disbursement of funds earmarked for climate change adaptation and mitigation. He further commented on the need for the global community to consider debt forgiveness for the Caribbean to alleviate the burden of disaster recovery given their vulnerability to climate change.
Executive Director of the Caribbean Disaster Emergency Management Agency, Mr. Jeremy Collymore shared the Prime Minister’s views on climate change and reiterated the growing concerns about climate change and adaptation in particular and the need for dialogue about roles and priorities in reducing losses and deepening involvement of the public sector and civil society in natural risk reduction partnerships. He emphasized that partnerships must be the vehicle through which commitment, resources and action transforms the risk profile of the vulnerable.
The Opening Ceremony is one facet of the week long conference which commenced on Monday December 6, 2010 and is being hosted by the Caribbean Disaster Emergency Management Agency (CDEMA) in association with its partners and in collaboration with The Office of Disaster Preparedness and Emergency Management (ODPEM).
To date the Caribbean Disaster Management (CDM) conference has explored various critical components in Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR), these include:
- Business Continuity Management (BCM) for Small Businesses
- Disaster Planning and Mitigation and the impact on small island economies.
- Development of a Caribbean Risk Atlas for Earthquake Hazards and
- Mainstreaming Climate Change Adaptation into Disaster Risk Reduction
The conference themed, “CDM: Strengthening Partnerships for Resilience” is a regional event of the International Strategy for Disaster Reduction (ISDR) global platform and is structured to promote good practice, share ongoing research, for the advancement of CDM in the Caribbean and to provide opportunities for facilitating networking among disaster management Practitioners, Public and Private sector organizations and other CDM Stakeholders.
The CDM conference will continue until Friday December 10, 2010.
