Tuesday, May 22 – The United Nations Development
Programme for Barbados and the Organisation of Eastern Caribbean States (OECS),
through its Regional Risk Reductive Initiative (R3i), is hosting a three-day
capacity building workshop to train participants in the use of Geographical Information
Systems (GIS) for disaster management, land use planning and development.
GIS
Officers Kahrim Skelton of the Town and Country Planning Department and Dillon
Robin from the Water and Sewerage Department are participating in the workshop
which commenced on Monday in the Cayman Islands.
This fourth regional
workshop will focus on introducing officials from throughout the Caribbean,
including the Virgin Islands, to the field of remote sensing and digital image
processing and its importance to disaster risk management. The workshop facilitators will demonstrate
approaches, tools and methodologies for extracting and analysing data remotely.
It is envisaged that by the end of the training, participating countries will
have better national capacity to:
- Understand
electromagnetic spectrum, and how it applies to remote sensing; - Interpret the basic
features and characteristics of earth surfaces on satellite imagery; and - Know how to extract
and interpret information from remotely sensed data.
Messers Skelton and Robin
will benefit from shared experiences on the initiatives undertaken to improve
their disaster preparedness and response, through a knowledge sharing event
which takes place on Thursday, 24 May at the Grand Cayman Marriot Beach Resort.
The presentations will focus on results
achieved so far through the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP)
Regional Risk Reduction Initiative (R3I) project and good practices that can be
built on. International development partner organisations and experts will also
participate, bringing together their knowledge and expertise on disaster
management issues.
Since 2009, the Virgin
Islands has been involved in discussions and projects under the R3i initiative to
reduce the risk and exposure to disasters through intra-regional learning and sharing of
tools, knowledge and best practices to enhance capacities to predict and
prepare for natural hazards.
The European Union is providing
€4.932 million over four years to achieve the project objectives. The project is expected to conclude in
December 2012.
