ABOUT THE SDC
The Social Development Commission (SDC) is the principal community organization agency working with Jamaica’s 783 communities. Positioned in the Ministry of Youth, Sports and Culture since 2007, the SDC continues to execute its legal mandate to inter alia, “promote and control schemes for, and to do any act or thing which may directly or indirectly serve the advancement of - sport, social, cultural & economic development - for the people of Jamaica and workers in particular”(S7/1965).
The SDC has undergone significant re-positioning, reflected by corporate strategies 2000-2003, 2003-2006, 2006-2009 and 2009-2012. The need to empower Jamaican communities to effectively function in an increasingly competitive global environment; the ever increasing complexity of social problems and the requirement for coordinated multi-sectoral approaches to solve these problems; and a changing political culture that recognizes and embraces community participation and strong local governance, are the common factors that guide the above mentioned corporate plans.
The SDC’s approach to community development resonated and continues to be in line with the international positioning that communities are to become more involved in identifying and designing strategies aimed at improving their quality of life. Jamaica is signatory to the millennium development goals that posits citizen involvement as both an imperative and an opportunity for development[1]. SDC’s core outputs are focused on a strong community governance mechanism, reliable disaggregated data to produce community profiles and community priority plans and programmes that identify needs, the required partnerships for success and the most suitable environment for quality service delivery.
[1]United Nations Volunteers Fact Sheet. http://www.unv.org/en/news-resources/resources/fact-sheets/unv-and-the-millennium-development-goals/doc/an-opportunity-and-an.html