The Min­istry of Cul­ture and Com­mu­ni­ty De­vel­op­ment has be­gun mul­ti-agency plan­ning for Car­ni­val 2026 fol­low­ing a stake­hold­er meet­ing held to­day at Queen’s Hall, Port of Spain.

Min­is­ter Michelle Ben­jamin host­ed the meet­ing as part of Gov­ern­ment prepa­ra­tions for the up­com­ing Car­ni­val sea­son. Dis­cus­sions fo­cused on co­or­di­na­tion, pub­lic safe­ty and op­er­a­tional arrange­ments for Car­ni­val ac­tiv­i­ties.

Al­so in at­ten­dance were Min­is­ter Khadi­jah Ameen, Rur­al De­vel­op­ment and Lo­cal Gov­ern­ment; Per­ma­nent Sec­re­tary (Ag.) Gwyneth Mor­ris-Alexan­der; May­or Chin­ua Al­leyne, Port of Spain; Deputy Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice Suzette Mar­tin, Gold Com­man­der, Trinidad and To­ba­go Po­lice Ser­vice; and Chief Ex­ec­u­tive Of­fi­cer Kei­ba Ja­cob-Mot­t­ley, Na­tion­al Car­ni­val Com­mis­sion of Trinidad and To­ba­go.

Stake­hold­ers ad­dressed sev­er­al ar­eas re­lat­ed to Car­ni­val 2026 plan­ning. These in­clud­ed se­cu­ri­ty arrange­ments in­volv­ing in­ter-agency de­ploy­ment and in­for­ma­tion shar­ing. Pub­lic safe­ty mea­sures, emer­gency pre­pared­ness and man­age­ment of pub­lic spaces were al­so dis­cussed.

Plan­ning for crowd con­trol cov­ered ac­cess and ex­it points, pub­lic move­ment and the use of shared re­sources dur­ing Car­ni­val events. San­i­ta­tion arrange­ments fo­cused on waste man­age­ment and venue clean­li­ness be­fore, dur­ing and af­ter ac­tiv­i­ties.

Health­care and emer­gency re­sponse plan­ning in­clud­ed the place­ment of med­ical fa­cil­i­ties, emer­gency teams and co­or­di­na­tion with health ser­vices. Mas and band op­er­a­tions were dis­cussed, in­clud­ing lo­gis­tics, route man­age­ment and safe­ty pro­to­cols.

Car­ni­val com­mu­ni­ca­tions strate­gies were out­lined, in­clud­ing pub­lic ad­vi­sories, in­for­ma­tion shar­ing and co­or­di­na­tion among agen­cies. Rep­re­sen­ta­tives from emer­gency ser­vices, Car­ni­val or­gan­i­sa­tions, lo­cal gov­ern­ment bod­ies, health agen­cies and se­cu­ri­ty agen­cies al­so par­tic­i­pat­ed.

Min­is­ter Ben­jamin said Car­ni­val plan­ning re­quires co­or­di­na­tion and con­tin­ued stake­hold­er en­gage­ment. Mem­bers of the pub­lic were ad­vised to fol­low the Min­istry and the Na­tion­al Car­ni­val Com­mis­sion for up­dates. A fol­low-up meet­ing is sched­uled for the first week of Feb­ru­ary