With 2026 being positioned to be a busy one for Jamaican sports, Jamaica Olympic Association (JOA) President Christopher Samuda says rural development and sports commercialisation are two of his biggest objectives.

Samuda, who has served as JOA president since 2017, is currently in his third and final term after being re-elected last August. He’s also the president of the Jamaica Paralympic Association as well as the vice-president of the Americas Paralympic Committee.

Samuda told the Jamaica Observer that greater focus will be placed on executing programmes outside of Kingston and St Andrew to ensure more of the nation’s athletes reach their full potential.

“We’ve always been sensitive to the view in sport that sport in Jamaica is Kingston-centric and, therefore, what we want to do is to build an arterial satellite organisation, which may necessarily not be brick and mortar, but it may be a human infrastructure, islandwide, to serve the interests of sport in various parishes and also to give them an opportunity to develop as they should,” he said.

“There’s a lot of talent in our parishes and that talent needs to be exposed, and that talent needs to be cultured and grown in the interest of our country. So we’re hoping to extend our network into the parishes to have an effective impact in terms of athlete identification and athlete growth and development, as well as to look at our administrators in sport, because our administrators are very vital from a policy and decision-making point of view.”

Jamaica Olympic Association President Christopher Samuda Photo: Joseph Wellington

While that will be a critical initiative, Samuda says he’s eager to see the completion of the redevelopment of the JOA’s headquarters, which he believes will bring significant financial benefits to the local sporting industry.

“I think that is very critical because what we are doing is revolutionising the business model of sport. We are saying that sport is not only a business now, but it’s a commercial multi-billion [-dollar] enterprise and, therefore, if we are to serve all [our] members, we have to ensure that we have a very strong financial base and this model that we are pursuing is of course to achieve that objective and that goal,” he said.

“So that’s my first thing that we complete the centre, which will become a home for athletes or coaches and administrators. It’s just not simply going to be a landmark that will look good and aesthetically pleasing. It’s going to be very functional and we are hoping that the conversation that we will have at our Olympic Manor and Olympic Centre will of course be critical to the development of sport and also the growth and development of our federation.”

The JOA boss is also hoping the Government will reintroduce the National Sports Council which has been inactive over the past decade.

“We’re hoping that we’ll be able to deepen our influence and impact across the island. We do not have, as we speak here now, functional sporting complexes that serve the interests of sport and fraternity. We have to look at that from a resource point of view. We have to look at that from a social point of view, because there’s a community perspective to the development of sport,” he said.

“We also have to look at, in terms of how we are going to develop a network, a business mechanism that will make sporting complexes and venues not only viable from an economic point of view, but also serve the talent in the respective parishes. It has to be a policy that has to be established that looks at the global and the national level and see how best that we can organise our sporting infrastructure to enhance development of sport, as well as to create a model that others may emulate regionally and globally.”