Letter of the Day | Understanding the need for NARA

THE EDITOR, Madam:

When a country faces a disaster as severe as Hurricane Melissa, the weaknesses of its institutions become painfully clear. Jamaica has relied for decades on the Office of Disaster Preparedness and Emergency Management (ODPEM), an agency that has guided the nation through multiple disasters and countless emergencies. ODPEM’s mandate remains indispensable. It coordinates early warnings, mobilizes shelters, directs response operations, and connects the many arms of the state that must work in concert when lives are in danger. Its focus is preparedness, mitigation, response, and the initial phases of recovery.What Hurricane Melissa demonstrated, however, is the stark difference between managing an emergency and rebuilding a country after an event that inflicts damage measured in multibillion-dollar figures. The government’s move to establish the National Reconstruction and Resilience Authority is not a rebuke of ODPEM. It is an acknowledgement that reconstruction on a national scale demands tools and capacities that the existing system simply does not possess.

Beyond the urgent tasks of relief and coordination lies a far more complex undertaking: restoring infrastructure, reconfiguring settlement patterns, rebuilding housing with stronger standards, and embedding resilience into every aspect of redevelopment. These demands require long-term planning, specialised engineering expertise, financial management at an unprecedented scale, and the authority to make decisions that transcend ministerial boundaries.

NARA is intended to fill that gap. Jamaica’s traditional administrative architecture, designed for normal conditions, is bound by procedures that ensure accountability but slow even routine public works. In a post-disaster environment, those same rules can obstruct progress. Reconstruction at emergency speed requires an institution that can integrate planning, procurement, financing, environmental standards, and climate adaptation into a single coherent framework. It requires the technical competence to evaluate where communities should be rebuilt, how infrastructure can be made climate-proof, and what measures are necessary to prevent future losses. NARA, if structured well, can provide this unified centre of gravity.

Concerns about duplication or institutional clutter are understandable, but they overlook a fundamental point. In the aftermath of a crisis of this magnitude, fragmentation is a recipe for stagnation. Without a central authority, reconstruction becomes uneven and slow, with competing priorities and overlapping mandates. A specialised body is better positioned to coordinate ministries, mobilise external financing, engage international partners, and sequence projects in a way that produces lasting gains rather than short-term fixes.

ODPEM remains essential for preparedness and emergency management. Strengthening it is still necessary. But rebuilding a nation requires more than the capacity to respond; it requires the capacity to reimagine and redesign.

That is why the creation of NARA matters. Yet its value will depend entirely on its execution. We hope NARA lives up to the ambitions set for it: that it recruits and empowers technical experts, applies rigorous climate resilience standards, and demonstrates a level of transparency and competence that earns public confidence. Jamaica deserves not only a rapid recovery but also a safer future. If NARA delivers on its mandate, it can help build that future and ensure that the devastation of Melissa becomes a turning point rather than a recurring chapter.

JUVELLE TAYLOR

juvelle.taylor@yahoo.com