ENVIRONMENTAL MANAGEMENT
Jamaica Social Investment Fund (JSIF) has always demonstrated a commitment to managing environmental impacts associated with its projects. The JSIF implements a variety of community projects, including small roads, buildings, water supply, sewage systems, community green spaces among others. Given JSIF’s recognition that these projects have the potential to impact the environment, JSIF has created and built on different levels of environmental management. It started with the development of the Environmental Management Framework (EMF), this was created to ensure compliance with the requirements of Jamaican environmental laws and regulations and the relevant policies of its funding agencies. The EMF is applicable to all projects financed by JSIF.
The main objectives of this EMF are to:
-
establish procedures for screening all proposed projects for their potential adverse environmental impacts and land requirements/acquisition;
-
specify measures for managing, mitigating and monitoring environmental impacts during project implementation and operation; and
-
outline the training and capacity-building arrangements needed to successfully implement the provisions of the EMF.
In order to ensure the effectiveness and relevance of the EMF, JSIF has started the development and implementation of an Environmental Management System (EMS). An EMS is an approach, which enables an organization to identify, monitor and control its environmental aspects, it incorporates the organizational structure, planning activities, responsibilities, practices, procedures, monitoring and tracking of set objectives. When the JSIF EMS is fully developed the organization will seek to have the system certified against ISO 14001.
