Next week, the Carib­bean Research programme of the Dutch Organisation for Scientific Research NWO will be hosting public meetings on Saba to discuss social issues and research, it was stated in a press release.

This because NWO is de­veloping a knowledge agenda with residents of the Caribbe­an part of the Kingdom, which maps out where the most pressing societal questions lie and how scientific research can contribute to answers to them. In June and July 2024, the NWO will organise public meetings in the six islands to check whether the content is recognised.

A “community conversation” mill take place on Tuesday, July 9, at the Queen Wilhelmina Li­brary in the Carmen Simmons Culture Complex The meeting will start at 6:30pm and will end at 9:30pm. Everyone is invited to join the conversation. Dur­ing the meeting, the team will identify which topic or topics are of high interest.

NWO will then organise a fol­low-up discussion on Wednes­day, July 10, at the Eugenius Johnson Center in Windward-side from 6:30pm to 9:30pm. You will receive more infor­mation about this during the meeting on Tuesday.

On the other days, shorter meetings will be held with inter­ested stakeholders. These may be individuals, representatives of organisations, or a number of organisations together. Dur­ing the visit to Saba there will also be meetings with research­ers. These meetings will focus on the conditions that enable conducting research.

The knowledge agenda was drawn up on the basis of ex­tensive surveys of residents and researchers of the six islands on social issues in 2019 and 2021. Following the “community conversations” and other dis­cussions in June and July, the revised knowledge agenda will be drawn up. The communities of the six islands are invited to participate in the sessions in order to decide for themselves what will be included in the knowledge agenda.

NWO also wants to know how the Caribbean commu­nities see a role for them­ selves in the development or implementation of scientific research. The final knowl­edge agenda will be pre­sented during the Dutch Ca­ribbean Research Week in November 2024. After that, NWO is keen to work with Caribbean communities to enable new research based on the knowledge agenda. The team that will conduct the interviews on Saba con­sists of Edrieenna Brandao, Lysanne Charles, Danick Trouwloon, Elton Villarreal and, on behalf of NWO, Dr. Arnold Lubbers, coordina­tor of the Caribbean Re­search programme. If you are interested in an inter­view, please contact carib­bean@nwo.n1 .

The Daily Herald.