First the Caribbean, then the world! CariSECURE, the Strengthening Evidence-Based Decision Making for Citizen Security in the Caribbean Project funded by USAID and implemented by UNDP is working with Caribbean governments to create solutions to realise SDG 16 and citizen security throughout the region. Notably, one of these solutions has met with such success, that it is being sought beyond the crystal blue waters of the Caribbean. CariSECURE’s Police Records Management Information System (PRMIS) has been selected as a Digital Public Good!
Becoming a public good, means that PRMIS, the platform which allows crime data to be accessible, comparable, and sharable, is fully accessible as a free, opensource, digital tool to countries within and outside the region. It will adhere to privacy and other applicable laws and best practices, do no harm by design, and will help attain the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). This is a big step for the CariSECURE project which was launched in 2016 with the first iteration of the project closing on October 31, 2022.
“What makes PRMIS valuable is its ability to increase efficiency and maximize resources, which are already scarce in the developing economies of the Caribbean and may be even more so within law enforcement and police services across the region,” Miguel Trim, Deputy Team Leader of the CariSECURE Project explained.
“PRMIS saves, time, money and resources by allowing police officers to capture, store, retrieve and share information without having to manually write reports, or sift through [and manually compare] hundreds of printed forms and files to access needed information,” he stated adding, “its value lies in digitizing and facilitating policing processes and essentially putting these processes at the fingertips of law enforcement.”
Speaking to the versatility of the software, Andre Waterman, ICT Analyst on the CariSECURE Project noted that Police forces within the Caribbean are adapting the plat form to their individual needs. For example, in Barbados, officers have begun collecting crime data remotely via electronic notebooks (small handheld tablets the size of a cellphone with the PRMIS platform installed) as this application makes it extremely easy to collect data on the go. In-car dashboards are also being deployed across the region and are expected to significantly enhance the speed and efficiency at which data from the field can be transmitted and utilized to provide insights to citizen security officers.
As a public good the uses of PRMIS are limitless. It can innovate and transform the citizen security sphere in the Caribbean, and with requests to replicate the platform from UNDP Offices as far as Djibouti, it can very likely change the world!
