THE Office of Disaster Preparedness and Emergency Management (ODPEM), through the Building Disaster Resilient Community (BDRC) project, has partnered with the Caribbean Institute of Media and Communication (CARIMAC) at the University of the West Indies to promote disaster resilience in Jamaica.

The BDRC is funded by the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA) with the goal of ensuring long-term hazard prevention by strengthening communities’ ability to respond proactively to natural and man-made disasters. The three-year BDRC project was launched in 2008 and is being implemented in 29 communities selected based on their susceptibility to certain natural disasters.

“Engaging communities and promoting the principles of comprehensive disaster management requires sustained and effective communication. Meeting the communication demands of the BDRC project will require partnerships with communications practitioners,” noted director general of the ODPEM, Ronald Jackson.

The partnership with CARIMAC is to assist the BDRC by allowing final-year students of the Communication Analysis and Planning II (CAP 2) course to do their class projects on the BDRC. CAP 2 is designed to offer participants the opportunity to formulate a feasible development support communication project and to implement the project.

“At the UWI, we like to give our students opportunities to practise what they learn in the classroom, and the partnership with ODPEM will do just that,” said course co-ordinator, Dr Livingston White.

Of the 29 BDRC communities, the students selected the three communities of Swift River in Portland; Gregory Park in St Catherine; and New River in St Elizabeth — areas which usually experience significant flooding during heavy rainfall.

In these communities, the students will implement various communication support activities geared towards helping individuals with the communication aspect of their emergency response; promote disaster resilience among students through their curriculum; and create messages encouraging participation in BDRC training activities.

The BDRC hopes to replicate these communication activities based on their successful implementation in the three pilot communities.