KINGSTON, Jamaica (JIS) – The Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Foreign Trade will take ownership of the database captured under the online Diaspora Mapping initiative, now that the project has ended. Funded by the International Organisation for Migration (IOM), the project was undertaken in conjunction with the ministry. It aimed to capture the location, interests and skills of members of the Diaspora, while building the Jamaican Government’s capacity to more effectively and strategically engage its Diaspora. Speaking at the ministry’s quarterly press briefing recently at its offices in New Kingston, Minister of Foreign Affairs and Foreign Trade, Senator Kamina Johnson Smith, said the ministry will soon be taking ownership of the database. “We have recently got Cabinet’s approval to sign an agreement with them to take ownership of the database of persons and organisations that had indicated they were willing to be a part of the process,” she said. She said the ministry will be reviewing the project with the intention of starting a new one in due course. “The ministry has taken the decision that we will review the project and we will reposition it. We will take the more than 2,000 signatories, persons who have agreed to be part of the database, and then we will review it,” she said. She said the ministry will have to determine how best to proceed with the next project and “how to engage people, so they want to be involved and to participate”. “It may not be called the mapping project again, because we have found that even the term ‘mapping’ was not engaging for some members of the Diaspora,” she added. The minister said the database had captured some 2,300 people.