Today BELTRAIDE and the Latin American and Caribbean Economic System, abbreviated in Spanish as “SELA,â€￾ hosted officials from throughout Latin America and the Caribbean to talk about continuing business after natural disasters.  

The workshop was tailor-made for Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises to learn about natural disaster risk management. Participants were advised on how to prepare their businesses for natural disasters, and to ensure that their livelihoods are safeguarded should a major disaster occur. We spoke to Beltraide representative Shari Williams, as well one of the presenters, Yves Davila, about the event...

Shari Williams- Beltraide Representative
“The Ministry with responsibility for investment trade and commerce is actually hosting the workshop via Beltraide. We are very delighted to have over 19 international participants here from 12 different countries throughout the SELA region, both Latin America, South America and the Caribbean. We also have 20 Belizean participants taking part and we have a wide cross section of participants: we have some business owners, some cooperatives, insurances, just all the stakeholders who would be a part of risk management when there is a natural disaster and how businesses survive such an event. It’s something we want to share with all medium, micro and small enterprises in Belize. The whole idea of the workshop is to bring awareness to businesses of how they or their suppliers of goods or services might be affected during an adverse event, and to kind of put together some kind of methodology in place as to when a natural disaster occurs- what happens? And how do I proceed? And how do I ensure that my business continues after such an adverse event?â€￾

Yves Davila- Presenter
“The main idea is how small/medium companies will be preparing in case of disaster and they can move forward in their business; for example if they have a fire or a flue, or maybe just, for example, a pandemic. So the processes and the services that I provide to the customer will be stopped. The main idea of this training session and these workshops are basically, how can they be prepared to continue the operations, continue providing the services that they have.â€￾

Alex Courtenay- Reporter
“So now when thinking about employing these strategies, if you are thinking of starting up a new business or even if you already have an existing business and you want to continue using these strategies, how important is it for business owners to be aware of this kind of thing?â€￾

Yves Davila
“I always make the example of life insurance, when you die everybody maybe will have an insurance for those situations and I spend my money each month on that because I need to be, in case I pass away, my kids and my family can be protected. So basically I’m spending my money every month for that insurance coverage. But if you see you never die, I never pass away but I’m spending my money all the time and I never chose that insurance. The expectation is that I don’t want to use it but I need to have it. So it’s basically the same with business continuity. You are prepared in case of a disaster but you never expect and you never want a disaster but you have to spend your money for something that may never happen. So at the end, the main idea is that you be prepared.â€￾

The workshop began today and will run through the end of the week.