The Sint Maarten Nature Foundation has started a new research project under the lead of Master student Joey de Hamer, who is studying Development and Rural Innovation at the Wageningen University located in the Netherlands, concentrated on disaster studies and in particular disaster governance. His research is focused on disaster governance on St. Maarten in the wake of hurricane Irma, which devastated the island in September 2017.
De Hamer is researching how the island has responded to Irma and what this response has resulted in. Knowledge will be gathered about how St. Maarten has proceeded in the recovery process in the aftermath of Irma and to what extent this has led to the development of several situations affecting life on the island.
Both the response and recovery process will be researched and analyzed by planning several interviews with involved stakeholders. Therefore the Nature Foundation is encouraging involved stakeholders and interested persons to share their experiences and ideas on both the response and recovery processes in the aftermath of Irma. If you would like to participate and talk to de Hamer about your experiences and opinions or if you know someone who would like to contribute, you can contact him via his e-mail – joey.dehamer@wur.nl – or via his phone number – (721) 581-5121 (no WhatsApp). All the gained research data will be treated confidential, names and locations will not be mentioned in the report and will not be retraceable.