PORT OF SPAIN, Trinidad, September 17th 2013 – Montserrat is to present a case study on how Information Communication Technology (ICT) is being used on island in Disaster Risk Management (DRM) situations at the ICT for DRM workshop taking place in Trinidad & Tobago this week.
On Wednesday morning, National ICT Council Members Nerissa Golden and Dr. Samuel Joseph are to discuss with their peers from around the region, how ICT has been used on Montserrat to support disaster mitigation and response.
Disaster Management and Coordination Agency (DMCA) Director Billy Darroux attended the Monday Meeting of the Experts where they reviewed a UN regional report on ICTs for Disaster Risk Management in the Caribbean researched and written by Atiba Phillips.
Darroux said: “The report revealed that there is some distance between national DRM strategies and the national ICT strategies, while recognising that ICT is a DRM tool and the use of it should be prioritised as part of disaster response.”
The DMCA head also noted that in many countries of the region, ICT priorities are usually focused on data management and financial systems. “Most ICT platforms don’t have a disaster risk reduction strategy and if the national ICT structures were damaged that could be a disaster in itself.”
The two-day course which follows Monday’s meeting is an effort by the United Nation’s Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC) to increase the available knowledge of the use of ICT in disaster response across the region.
Areas of the course include: Identifying information challenges with disaster response, Social Media in Disaster, and discussions on the future strategies for the sub-regional and national level.
Two participants from each of the four sub-regional focal point countries (Antigua & Barbuda, Barbados, Jamaica and Trinidad & Tobago) of the Caribbean Disaster Emergency Management Agency (CDEMA) and Montserrat are being trained. It is the intention that the participants will serve as resource to champion DRM in ICT in their respective organisations and countries.
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