Holness accepts ESRI GIS award as Jamaica advances procurement, housing and special-education plans

Jamaica is being cited as a standout in applying geographic information systems to planning, disaster readiness and evidence-based policy. Prime Minister Dr. Andrew Holness is in San Diego, California, to collect the 2026 ESRI President’s Award for the Government’s integrated national geospatial network and its use of GIS in data-driven governance. The honour is due at the Environmental Systems Research Institute User Conference, running from July 13 to 17, 2026.

Speaking in an executive insights session, Dr. Holness said GIS remains vital to development and especially to countries such as Jamaica. He cited its role in crime-fighting, land titling and settlement work, forest management, and responses to severe weather including Hurricane Melissa. The Government, he said, has woven GIS into nearly every operation. With about 80 per cent of the population living near the coast and threats arriving from the sea—hurricanes and rising sea levels among them—he argued that towns sited on flood plains and other settlement legacies leave Jamaica needing spatial intelligence to reorganise over the next century. Geography, he added, is the country’s greatest asset and merits heavy GIS investment.

Separately, a 12-month MSME procurement integration project is set to widen access for small firms to public contracts and support growth. Launched recently at the Iberostar Hotel in St. James, it is led by the Public Procurement Commission with the Ministry of Finance and the Public Service, the Ministry of Industry, Investment and Commerce, the Development Bank of Jamaica and other partners. Readiness boot camps will cover how procurement works, supplier registration, financial preparedness and competitive bidding. The Finance Minister said winning a contract is only the start, as firms buy more inputs, hire staff, upgrade equipment, raise standards, pay more tax and lift local spending and lending.

Industry Minister Senator Aubyn Hill, at Kingston’s 12th Christmas in July trade show last Thursday, urged producers to look past Jamaica’s three million consumers toward buyers in markets such as Bogotá, Lagos, Nairobi, Singapore, Miami, Atlanta and New York. Brand Jamaica’s global goodwill, he said, must become repeat export contracts and lasting relationships for goods and for high-value services including design, consulting, finance, wellness and digital offers—starting with formalising and registering businesses and using state help on branding, certification and export readiness.

Urban Development Corporation board chairman Norman Brown said the UDC will add housing on corporation land to other state shelter programmes, noting a shortfall of roughly 125,000 units. Plans exceed 20,000 homes islandwide, including Kingston, St. Catherine, St. Elizabeth and St. Ann, with rebuilding in southwestern Jamaica, spanning affordable to higher-income tiers to ease supply and price pressure.

Education Minister Dr. Dana Morris Dixon announced a new special-education diagnostic centre will open in Portland in September, so families in Portland and St. Mary need not travel to Kingston for assessments. She spoke at the Rotary Club of St. Andrew’s 60th installation at the Jamaica Pegasus Hotel in New Kingston. Centres already stand at Church Teachers’ College in Manchester and Sam Sharpe Teachers’ College in St. James. Scholarship support for educational and clinical psychology, speech and occupational therapy and related care will help staff the sites and follow diagnosis with treatment.