Belize Advances Disaster Preparedness with UN Initiative

Belize is strengthening its disaster preparedness with the UN’s Early Warnings for All Initiative. Today, NEMO hosted its second national workshop under the programme, which is designed to give countries the technical capacity to detect hazards early and respond effectively.

National Emergency Coordinator Daniel Mendez said the event is “the second part of our implementation of a programme… to ensure that by the year 2030, everyone on Earth has access to an early warning system.”

Mendez added that NEMO works with multiple partners since not every hazard falls directly under its authority. “If there’s an oil spill, we have to work with the lead organisation, but the important thing is how do we ensure that information gets to people in a timely manner?”

The initiative goes beyond hurricanes and covers other threats, some not as direct, such as the sargassum crisis.

“We are not the lead agency for sargassum response, but we have provided input into the response, and this also fits into that idea of determining the early warning components. How do we ensure that all the stakeholders who were affected by sargassum were provided enough early warning to know what’s coming? So that’s really the idea and how we can strengthen that,” Mendez said. “This is how NEMO contributes to that without necessarily having to be the ones who provide the message to our partners but to ensure that someone with the ability to do it is able to do so.”

The programme aligns with the UN’s goal of universal access to early warning systems by 2030, with accelerated action to meet that target by 2027.