Within the work of the International Organization for Migration (IOM) in Panama to strengthen migrant centres and institutional capacities in the province of Chiriquí according to humanitarian standards, a series of essential activities have been identified for the care, maintenance, and support of the population residing within temporary accommodation through the Survey of Needs of Migratory Reception Stations (ERM in Spanish). 

For the execution of these essential activities, and as a continuous response to the needs of the population, workshops were developed with a team of volunteers, migrant population, and IOM focal points present in the ERM of Los Planes de Gualaca in the Chiriquí province. Representatives of government institutions such as the National Migration Service, the Ministry of Health, the National Police, among others, participated, adding the necessary tools to strengthen the humanitarian aid plan.  

These workshops began in February, with the aim of implementing the essential activities for the care and maintenance of temporary accommodation and aiding the migrant population in the ERM under the recommendations of the Temporary Accommodation Management Manual, in addition to strengthening the capacities of government actors in the field of accommodation management. 

Since February 2022, leisure workshops have been held to improve the physical and social well-being of migrants in the ERM of Los Planes de Gualaca, based on the guidelines of the Guide for Psychosocial Care for Migrants in Mesoamerica and the Technical Note on Mental Health for the Migrant and Refugee population in Panama. 

Likewise, the organization has supported with posters or communication elements on basic standards of maintenance of the facilities and hygiene in general and carried out weekly activities of health and hygiene promotion in the ERM through supplies, brochures, talks, delivery of hygiene kits and workshops dictated and directed by the IOM team in the field. In addition, a multipurpose space will be implemented soon that can have a cubicle for health care, another to establish a communication channel for other institutions that can carry out specific cases, and a physical space for IOM staff members to use when needed. 

"We will tend to primary health needs, assist the care of healing wounds, injectables, and preparation for the approach of patients who require medical evacuation," explained Jazmine Hernández of IOM in Panama. 

In the coming months of 2022, IOM will seek to provide support with building materials for the improvements of common spaces such as the dining room, adult and children's recreation areas, improvement of exit checkpoints, hydration points, and hand washing stations. 

Among the essential activities related to the protection of the population in the ERM is the coordination of a protection space with other actors through the different institutional bodies and the creation of referral routes for cases. It also seeks to establish convenient methods of coordination to ensure the rapid and daily transfer of migrants to health centres in case of emergency and to establish methods to ensure that migrants have constant access to adequate means of family planning. 

"Within the essential activities related to the management of information in the ERM, we seek to establish a system of accountability in the form of a suggestion box, place updated charts of minimum standards of coexistence in different languages, develop participatory structures through committees for the integration of migrants within the ERM, place loudspeakers to disseminate information in different languages and posters or informative murals for the dissemination of information of any kind for the migrant population," Hernández said. 

In 2019, IOM Panama and the Ministry of Public Security signed a cooperation agreement to strengthen capacities in the coordination and management of temporary shelters for massive groups of migrants stranded in the country. 

Within the framework of this important cooperation agreement, the Temporary Accommodation Management Manual was created, which has been developed and adapted to the context and needs of the country, and seeks to illustrate the best international practices and minimum technical standards to provide protection and assistance to massive irregular flows. 

These actions are implemented with the support of IOM's Western Hemisphere Program, funded by the United States Department of State's Bureau of Population, Refugees and Migration.   

For more information, contact IOM Panama's communications team via iompanama@iom.int.