Township Planning Strategies for Storm Surge
Toolkit Validation Workshop
Blue Horizon Hotel, Barbados

Opening Remarks
By
Elizabeth Riley, Programme Manager,
Caribbean Disaster Emergency Response Agency (CDERA)
September 13, 2007

Salutations:

On behalf of the Coordinator of the Caribbean Disaster Emergency Response Agency (CDERA), I welcome you to this Township Planning Strategies for Storm Surge, Toolkit Validation Workshop.

Approximately two years ago the first technical meeting of this initiative was convened. Firmly anchored within the context of the regional Comprehensive Disaster Management Strategy (CDM), we discussed and agreed on the way forward in achieving our purpose of developing capacity and methodologies for incorporating storm surge risk analysis into long term development strategies of town planners and emergency managers.

The urgent need for this intervention has been repeatedly demonstrated by the damage to coastal infrastructure within our region due to hydro-meteorological events. Our existing vulnerability is more clearly revealed when we recognize that it is in many cases non-catastrophic events which have repeatedly caused significant damage to coastal infrastructure. Hurricane Dean affected us just three weeks ago. Preliminary estimates have indicated damage of US$5.7M in damage to sea walls in Dominica and US$2.5M to piers and other coastal infrastructure on Caye Caulker and Ambergris Caye in Belize. This was by no measure a direct hit to either territory.

Concerns raised by the magnitiude of losses associated with these events are compounded by the potential for increased frequency and severity of hydro-meteorological hazards on our region associated with global climate change. Heightened climate variability has already been reflected in recent decades.

At the national and regional levels, these events have placed increasing strain on already stretched preparedness and response mechanisms and have resulted in the diversion of critical funds previously earmarked for development activities. With several of our territories having large concentrations of development within 1 km of the shoreline, there is therefore great urgency to prioritize disaster loss reduction generally and specifically within our coastal zones if we are to sustain our socio-economic progress.

Today’s workshop brings us closer to achieving that goal. Through the technical support of Smith Warner International, we have before us for review a draft toolkit – a technical information package which is designed to assist development professionals in the region to identify and reduce risk from the storm surge hazard. Your role today is to assist us in its finalization through critical review, frank and constructive recommendations emerging from your collective experiences.

As we undertake our discussions during this workshop and (for some of us) within the steering committee later today, I urge that attention be paid to mechanisms for the sustainability of this work. Whilst we are cognizant of the role that our development partners must play in supporting these efforts, it is equally important that at the national level we commit to integration of the initiative’s outputs into our work programming. For us at CDERA, results must be measurable and sustained. We therefore look forward to further expansion of the applications to our other Participating States, integration of the methodologies and results into national work programming and our institutions of learning and finally infusion of lessons learnt into follow up project design.

In closing let me express thanks on behalf of CDERA to the Inter American Development Bank for support and its demonstrated commitment to this process through technical and administrative inputs; and to our steering committee members – Caribbean Institute of Meteorology and Hydrology, Caribbean Community Climate Change Center, University of the West Indies, Department of Emergency Management and the Coastal Zone Management Unit in Barbados and the Office of Disaster Preparedness and Emergency Management in Jamaica for their dedication to making this happen at the national level.

I anticipate a successful outcome from this workshop.

Thank you.