Bank of Jamaica Mitigating Risks and Enhancing Operational Resilience with Offsite Location

• The Bank of Jamaica (BOJ) is taking steps towards increasing its operational resilience including relocating some of its operations to a recently acquired property in St. Andrew. The operations to be carried out at the new location will not include services to the public.
• Explaining the rationale for the decision to activate the operational centre in addition to its downtown Kingston headquarters, BOJ Governor Richard Byles noted that central banking functions are critical to business activity and government operations for the entire country and are required to facilitate business transactions between Jamaica and the rest of the world.
• “The location of the Bank on the Kingston waterfront makes it particularly vulnerable to geological activities such as earthquakes and to the potential effects of sea level rise either by itself or resulting from an earthquake or storm surges driven by tropical cyclones. As part of our risk management, BOJ plans for various eventualities and seeks to minimise the possibility of a complete shutdown of its operations in the event of a disaster,” Mr. Byles explained.
• “Building operational resilience and mitigating risks of various forms is especially critical as Bank of Jamaica prepares to assume wider prudential responsibilities for the regulation and supervision of the entire financial sector. With this in mind, planning for expansion at our current site while also ensuring adequate mitigation of risks to critical operational functions are not mutually exclusive.” Mr. Byles pointed out.

(Source: JIS)