The second Jamaica Dragon Boat Festival will feature a larger field and international competition when it returns to Port Royal next weekend.

Organisers launched the event on Friday at the Grand Hotel Excelsior Port Royal, where racing will take place on June 20 and 21 in Kingston Harbour.

Three overseas teams — two from The Bahamas and one from Trinidad and Tobago — are among an expanded list of competitors expected to challenge local teams that have spent the past year preparing for the event.

Chinese Benevolent Association (CBA) Dragon Boat Festival Committee Chairman Vincent Chang said the CBA hopes the festival will become a permanent fixture on Jamaica’s sporting calendar.

“I am here because we at the Chinese Benevolent Association believe this is a festival that should be here in Jamaica forever because the dragon boat has a lot of things we believe can help build the Jamaican community,” Chang said.

The inaugural festival drew a large crowd to Port Royal last year and Chang expects this year’s event to be even more competitive.

“We’ll have more teams, we’ll have tighter races,” he said. “Some of the teams have been abroad, a lot more experience, and I do believe we’ll get more interest from the wider Jamaican community.”

The festival has received support from both the Chinese Embassy and the Jamaica Defence Force (JDF), whose Coast Guard team shared the title with the CBA at last year’s event.

Among the teams entered this year are Baha Mar Buoys and Gulls and BCDS Buccaneers from The Bahamas, Vanguard Dragon Boat Club of Trinidad and Tobago, the Chinese Embassy, JDF Coast Guard, Port Royal Blazers, Hydra Jamaica, LASCO, and McKay Security.

Joseph Miller, a member of the CBA team that shared the title in 2025, expressed confidence that his team can successfully defend its crown.

“We believe that we can win because of our ability and the sports that we do,” Miller said.

Neil Yap Sam, one of the festival’s organisers and coaches, said dragon boat racing continues to grow locally as more Jamaicans become exposed to the sport.

The festival will open next Saturday morning with the traditional eye-dotting ceremony before preliminary races get under way. Competition will continue on Sunday, culminating with the awards presentation.

Dragon boat racing originated in China more than 2,000 years ago and is now contested in more than 75 countries. The sport requires crews to paddle in synchrony to the beat of a drum mounted at the front of the boat.