Hemispheric Countries Urged to Collaborate to Counter Aviation Risks

Minister of Housing, Transport, Water and Works, Robert Pickersgill, has called for increased collaboration among countries in the western hemisphere to counteract the risks and challenges involved in aviation transportation.
Citing incidents such as the 2001 terror attack on the United States, the Minister said “indeed, the most profound lesson that has been taught to our generation is the indivisibility of human security and the wisdom of collective responsibility in meeting global threats”.
“Apart, we are weak and vulnerable, but together we can be strong.we must strive to strengthen our work bilaterally and through the mechanism of the International Civil Aviation Organisation,” the Minister said, as he addressed the 9th Executive Committee of the Western Hemisphere Transport Initiative (WHTI) today (Aug. 23) at the Jamaica Conference Centre.
According to Mr. Pickersgill, hemispheric cooperation was especially important, since small developing countries such as Jamaica, were so heavily reliant on aviation transportation to sustain their successful tourism sectors.
He pointed out that tourism was a multi-trillion business with a projected seven per cent growth over the next decade, and collaborative ventures such as WHTI “provides small nations with a forum where they can be a part of a shared vision and responsibility for multimodal transportation.”
Noting that aviation risks were greater than they were 10 years ago, Minister Pickersgill said that governments, including that of Jamaica, were fully aware of the importance of providing adequate infrastructure, skills and policy frameworks, to ensure safe transportation services.
He said the role of the Civil Aviation Authority had been expanded in response to the potential risks, and implored member states of WHTI to accede to “the new Systems Approach to Safety Oversight stipulated by the International Civil Aviation Organisation”.
He further pointed to the existence of “next generation transport systems,” and suggested that governments in the hemisphere could “explore these technological developments so we can take the quantum leap where necessary and move forward in unison towards a seamless and efficient hemispheric air transport system.”
On the matter of marine transportation, the Minister spoke of the importance of adequate information and communication systems in compliance with International Maritime Organisation (IMO) standards, noting that the Jamaican government had spent some US$25 million in meeting these regulations. He informed the meeting that the annual cost of providing security at the ports was $1.5 billion.
During the two-day meeting, which Jamaica is hosting for the first time, delegates will review the outcomes of the last ministerial meeting held in Brazil in August 2005, while several working groups, including the Maritime Working Group and the Group of Experts on Airline Safety Aviation (GEASA), will provide updates.
Delegates from the United States, Canada, Brazil, Trinidad and Tobago, Bahamas, Haiti, Uruguay, Colombia, Mexico, the Dominican Republic and St Kitts & Nevis were represented at today’s opening sessions, which was also addressed by the Director of the Summit of the Americas Secretariat, Organization of American States, Luis Alberto Rodriguez.