Press Release From ODPEM - September 30, 2026
(ODPEM) hosted the All-Risk Management Jamaica & Haiti Coordination Knowledge Exchange to strengthen cooperation in preparing for and responding to emergencies. The week-long training, held from 21–25 September 2026, brought together disaster management practitioners from Jamaica, Haiti and the United States.
The programme focused on strengthening cross-country disaster preparedness, building a shared understanding of all-risk management, enhancing leadership capacity in wildfire management, improving multi-agency coordination, and fostering policy alignment and sustainable partnerships.
Sessions drew on lessons from Haiti’s earthquake response and Jamaica’s Hurricane Melissa preparedness and response. The event also included risk assessment workshops, Executive Incident Command System training, and coordination exercises designed to strengthen joint command and control, interoperability, trust, and communication among participating agencies.
“Effective disaster response depends on coordination arrangements that are established, understood and tested before an emergency occurs. This Knowledge Exchange gives Jamaica and Haiti an important opportunity to strengthen those arrangements, improve interoperability among agencies and apply lessons from past disasters to the realities of an all-risk environment. The objective of this exchange is practical: clearer responsibilities, better information-sharing and more coordinated decision-making so that we can respond faster and more effectively when communities are at risk.”
The programme also gave participants opportunities to apply these principles through realistic emergency scenarios, requiring them to share information, coordinate response actions, and make timely joint decisions.
Mr. Emmanuel Pierre, Director of Haiti’s Directorate General of Civil Protection (DGPC), highlighted the importance of the people and relationships behind effective disaster management.
“We sometimes view disaster risk management as a succession of plans, procedures and tools. These elements are essential. However, their effectiveness ultimately depends on the women and men who implement them, on their ability to work together, communicate, trust each other and make decisions in situations where time is often limited. This exchange allowed us to move beyond theoretical frameworks as practitioners.”
Other activities included expert discussions on wildfire behaviour, early detection and predictive modelling; leadership exercises focused on decision-making under pressure; a policy roundtable on integrating wildfire management into national all-risk strategies; discussions on standardised training and qualification systems; and community engagement.
Participants included incident commanders, directors and managers from ODPEM; Haiti’s DGPC, Ministry of Environment, and Directorate of Forests and Renewable Energy (DFER); the Jamaica Fire Brigade; the Forestry Department; and the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) Forest Service International Programs and Trade.
The initiative received technical assistance from the USDA Forest Service International Programs and Trade and funding from the United States Department of State.
The exchange reinforced the institutional relationships necessary for effective cooperation between Jamaica and Haiti, including Jamaica’s role as the Caribbean Disaster Emergency Management Agency’s north-western sub-regional focal point. By combining knowledge sharing, operational exercises, and policy dialogue, the initiative is expected to strengthen ongoing collaboration and support a more coordinated and interoperable approach to disaster preparedness and response.
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