Young persons complete Community Disaster Response Training in Bense Anse, De Mai and Anse Sol Dat

Training participants

By encouraging disaster preparedness, risk mitigation, and early warning actions in communities through its Community Disaster Response Training (CDRT) programs, the Dominica Red Cross continues to build resilience in its Disaster Preparedness efforts.

The National Society trained people in the Bense, Anse De Mai, and Ans Sol Dat villages for the 2022–2023 program year.

The Community group was instructed in Climate Change, Elements of a Resilient Community, Disaster Management, Disaster Preparedness, Conducting Assessments, Communications, Psychosocial Support, and Light Search and Rescue.

The teams were provided with a range of tools to help them prepare for, and carry out, their mitigation and response tasks. In an effort to identify regions vulnerable to dangers and to make evacuation easier in the case of a disaster, people of the community were also involved in creating their own community disaster plans and mapping their towns.

In an interview with DNO, Disaster Coordinator of the Dominica Red Cross Society, Karen Riviere Cuffy stated that over the years the Dominica Red Cross has been engaging communities around the island through its Community Disaster Response Team (CDRT) Training.

This training is specifically done in the community where persons volunteer to be part of the CDRT team and once persons have volunteered, they are trained in various aspects of Disaster Management and Response.

“This is to facilitate a better-prepared community in light of any adverse event which could be a hurricane, flooding, landslides, and so on,” she said.

“What we’re trying to do through this training is to create the capacity in the community for persons to be able to help themselves in the event that it is required.”

One of the advantages Cuffy stated she noticed coming from this specific training is that it united persons in the community.

“Red Cross is an organization that is all-inclusive. We have to bring that type of thinking to the communities and teach the persons that each and every individual in the community has a part to play in enhancing, preparing, and responding in the face of disaster,” she expressed.

Response equipment was provided to the village council that can be utilized by the community in addition to the personal protection equipment given to the individual participants of the training.

After the training, it is expected that persons continue to support their communities since they will be the disaster team within the community, and are required to work with the village council and Red Cross.

Twenty-one other CDRTs have been established in Dominica over the years in 21 communities including Marigot and Wotten Waven.

At the closing ceremony held on March 30, 2023, Parliamentary Representative for the constituency Miss Lakeyia Joseph, congratulated the participants of the program on their successful completion of the program and thanked the Dominica Red Cross for this significant contribution to the community in Disaster Preparedness.

The program was funded by the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC), The United States Agency for International Development (USAID)/BHA.

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1 Comment

  1. If we knew better
    April 26, 2023

    i know age is just a number but i not seeing young people. some hard back in the second and 3rd row. Some character in the first row.

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