Twenty-three young men from the Gordon Town community have recently finished a two-day training session is building and packing gabion baskets. The training session started on Tuesday of this week, and ended on Wednesday with a certificate presentation ceremony at the Gordon Town Community Centre.

The training session was organised in a joint effort between the USAID/COMET II Project and the National Works Agency. The teenAGE Observer had the opportunity to speak with Kwame Emmanuel, global climate change coordinator with the USAID/COMET II Project, who explained the rationale behind the session.

“The aim of this training is to improve the adaptive capacity of the citizens to reduce climate change vulnerability related to intense rainfall events. COMET II also wanted to see to it that the participants’ developed their income earning potential.”

For those of wondering what gabion baskets are, these are metal wired cages that are packed with relatively large stones, used to construct retaining walls used to stabilize shorelines, rivers banks, or slopes against erosion or land slippage. Considering Gordon Town’s vulnerability to several of these natural disasters, it is certainly a plus that these young men from the community now have the skills to build their own retaining structures using gabion baskets.

The opening session of ‘day one’ of the training was focused on theory. Stephen Henriques, the director at Kingston Industrial Agencies and a provider of gabion baskets for over 40 years, conducted the class with a natural teacher’s charm that allowed the participants to relax, engage and feel comfortable making enquiries. He explained the different kinds of material used to build gabion baskets, and the particular methods are being used in Jamaica.

In the afternoon, the participants made their way outside to put what they had learnt to the test. They organised themselves into four groups, each building one gabion basket, and they really did demonstrate how teamwork makes the team work. They worked cohesively, putting the baskets together, wiring the edges and then packing the baskets with rocks. On ‘day two’, the trainees continued to practice their skills in putting the baskets together. The use of geotextiles with the baskets was also introduced.

“I feel really good to be able to do this training, and it is amazing how fast they learnt the skill”, commented Henriques as he watched the participants build and pack the baskets almost like professionals.

The teenAGE Observer also spoke with a few of the participants who shared their thoughts on the training session.

“The programme was really fun and I wish that it could go on longer”, shared Oral Mclean, a young organic farmer from the community.

Kevon Campbell, one of the younger participants shared, “I like that the training was not complicated, it was easy to catch the concepts and everything was alright after that.”

Kwame Emmanuel spoke to the long term benefits, not just for the youths who participated, but more importantly, the benefits to come for the whole Gordon Town community. “I look forward to the planning and implementation of phase two, which will be the construction of a small gabion wall somewhere in the Gordon Town community, hopefully by the end of September.” This upcoming project, he expressed, will provide a great opportunity for the young men to work and further develop the skill.