Ot­to Car­ring­ton

Se­nior Re­porter

ot­to.car­ring­ton@cnc3.co.tt

The Trinidad and To­ba­go Red Cross So­ci­ety is ap­peal­ing for stronger cor­po­rate and donor sup­port, as it seeks to raise $2 mil­lion for a new am­bu­lance and $500,000 to stage its 71st Chil­dren’s Car­ni­val, while un­der­tak­ing a broad­er ef­fort to se­cure the fu­ture of the long-run­ning event.

Speak­ing at the launch of the 2027 Red Cross Chil­dren’s Car­ni­val sea­son, yes­ter­day Halfhide said the com­mit­tee re­mained com­mit­ted to de­liv­er­ing what he de­scribed as “a show of car­ni­val ex­cel­lence,” de­spite ris­ing costs.

He ac­knowl­edged that the Red Cross can no longer re­ly sole­ly on tra­di­tion­al spon­sor­ship and must strength­en part­ner­ships with the pri­vate sec­tor and oth­er or­gan­i­sa­tions.

The call was echoed by act­ing T&T Red Cross So­ci­ety pres­i­dent Ed­ward Mood­ie, who said the or­gan­i­sa­tion must be­come more ag­gres­sive in pur­su­ing grants and al­ter­na­tive fund­ing sources. He chal­lenged the com­mit­tee to de­vel­op a roadmap to ac­cess fund­ing op­por­tu­ni­ties be­yond tra­di­tion­al spon­sor­ship.

“How do we come back now to the Car­ni­val Com­mit­tee to look for not just the spon­sor­ship?” Mood­ie asked.

“And yes, we are grate­ful for the spon­sor­ship that we have. How do we ex­pand in­to a realm that we have not touched as much?”

Halfhide said stag­ing the event has be­come in­creas­ing­ly ex­pen­sive, with some costs not ful­ly cov­ered by ex­ist­ing spon­sors.

As a re­sult, par­tic­i­pants in the 2027 com­pe­ti­tion, card­ed for Jan­u­ary 30, 2027, will have to pay a mo­bil­i­sa­tion fee for the first time, rang­ing from $50 for in­di­vid­u­als to $200 for large bands. Reg­is­tra­tion is ex­pect­ed to open on Oc­to­ber 1 and close around Jan­u­ary 20.

De­fend­ing the move, Halfhide said the fees would help off­set ex­pens­es.

“I know some peo­ple will quar­rel, ‘Oh, the tra­di­tion is mas for all,’ but mas for all does cost,” he said.

De­spite the fi­nan­cial chal­lenges, Halfhide said par­tic­i­pa­tion has in­creased sig­nif­i­cant­ly in re­cent years. More than 300 com­peti­tors took part in the 2026 event, with some in­di­vid­ual cat­e­gories at­tract­ing as many as 52 en­trants.

Halfhide said the Red Cross must con­tin­ue evolv­ing af­ter 71 years by mod­ernising prizes and cre­at­ing more op­por­tu­ni­ties for young de­sign­ers and mas­quer­aders.

He al­so hopes to de­vel­op part­ner­ships with diplo­mat­ic mis­sions and in­ter­na­tion­al agen­cies that could pro­vide schol­ar­ships or over­seas train­ing op­por­tu­ni­ties for out­stand­ing young Car­ni­val de­sign­ers.

“I’d love to see one day the de­sign­er of the year be­ing of­fered a chance to go to Chi­na or some­where where they can de­vel­op that skill,” he said.

Both Halfhide and Mood­ie ex­pressed con­cern over de­clin­ing spec­ta­tor at­ten­dance at Car­ni­val events.

Mood­ie urged or­gan­is­ers to ex­plore in­cen­tives that would en­cour­age greater par­tic­i­pa­tion by schools.

He al­so called for more young peo­ple to join the Car­ni­val Com­mit­tee, ar­gu­ing that youth-led de­ci­sion-mak­ing could help at­tract greater youth in­volve­ment.

“If a youth is able to make a de­ci­sion, that youth will pull the oth­er youth faster than we who may be think­ing in an­oth­er realm,” he said.

Halfhide sup­port­ed the push for suc­ces­sion plan­ning, say­ing the Red Cross wants to pre­serve the knowl­edge of vet­er­an Car­ni­val prac­ti­tion­ers while cre­at­ing op­por­tu­ni­ties for a new gen­er­a­tion.

He said ex­pe­ri­enced de­sign­ers and Car­ni­val icons should ac­tive­ly pass on their skills and ex­per­tise.

“We are a tra­di­tion, but we are cre­at­ing a fu­ture. And the on­ly way we can cre­ate that fu­ture is with your as­sis­tance.”

The com­mit­tee is al­so ex­pand­ing the Chil­dren’s Car­ni­val be­yond a sin­gle day in­to a year-round pro­gramme.

Among the planned ini­tia­tives is a show­case fea­tur­ing 14 de­sign­ers, al­low­ing band­lead­ers to en­gage with the pub­lic and pre­view their pre­sen­ta­tions for Car­ni­val 2027.