JIS: The Ministry of Education, Youth and Information, in collaboration with the Office of the Cabinet, has launched the Records and Information Management (RIM) Policy Implementation and Sensitisation Programme, geared towards ensuring that all activities and decisions of the Government are fully and accurately documented, managed and monitored.
The policy will govern records and information management across all ministries, departments and agencies (MDAs) of the Government.
Implementation of the RIM policy will facilitate accessible, efficient and effective service delivery to the citizenry; data sharing across MDAs; ease of doing business, research and attraction of investments; increased transparency and accountability through the creation, processing, maintenance, use and disposition of records in conformity with local policies, standards and international good practice; preservation of national and cultural identity; leveraging cultural assets; informing the citizenry; and the overall attainment of national development goals.
At the launch, held on October 4 at the Jamaica Conference Centre in downtown Kingston, Minister of Education, Youth and Information, Senator the Hon. Ruel Reid, said the RIM policy is transformational and will help with the storage of important records.
“Our reality today, in the digital age, is that every small unit has its own de facto registry, and each computer is host to volumes of official records, be it emails or documents, which are saved and stored, often in an unstructured way,” the Minister said.
“While this experience is not at all unique to Jamaica, we accept that without a robust RIM system which provides ready access to relevant and historical documents and which evidences our work, we cannot truly offer to the people of Jamaica good governance, sound policy development and decision-making, efficient and effective services or accountability and transparency,” he added.
The Minister called on the stakeholders present at the launch, who represented various government MDAs, to ensure that during the implementation there is adherence to managing their digital records in conformity with the prescriptions of the policy, especially with respect to emails, which are official records.
Senator Reid also thanked members of the Cabinet Office for their effort, which is contributing to the success of the Public Sector Transformation and Modernisation (PSTM) Programme.
Meanwhile, Director General, PSTM Programme, Office of the Cabinet, Veniece Pottinger-Scott, shared about the RIM policy.
“Implementation of the RIM programme originated within the overall work of the Public Sector Transformation and Modernisation Programme at the Cabinet Office, and is regarded as one of the major initiatives aimed at driving public-sector efficiency and enhancing the ease of doing business,” Mrs. Pottinger-Scott said.
“It is aligned with Jamaica’s economic growth priorities articulated in the Vision 2030 – National Development Plan. It seeks to address systemic issues that significantly affect public-sector performance, [with] information management being one of them; and records. As such, it is prioritised that the improvement of the quality of government data and the strengthening of information sharing across government, must be our priority,” she added.
Copies of the Government of Jamaica Records and Information Management Policy were also presented at the launch to Permanent Secretaries and Directors of Documentation, Information and Access Services in the various ministries.
CAPTION: Minister of Education, Youth and Information, Senator the Hon. Ruel Reid (left), listens to Director General, Public Sector Transformation and Modernisation Programme, Office of the Cabinet, Veniece Pottinger-Scott, at the launch of the Records and Information Management (RIM) Policy Implementation and Sensitisation Programme on Thursday (October 4) at the Jamaica Conference Centre in downtown Kingston.