A global review of disaster reduction initiatives - Welcome to the ...

preparedness are frequently attributed to lack of training,awareness, education, and self-reliance within thecommunities. An appropriately educated and trainedcommunity is much more capable to cope successfullywith natural hazards and to reduce their impacts.Building understanding: development of knowledge and information sharingparticularly at furthering disaster management inschools, such as by demonstrating a model earthquakeevacuation drill. Following this training, it is expectedthat disaster preparedness will be reflected in moreschool curricula across Asia.4Asia and the PacificThe School Earthquake Safety Initiative is beingimplemented by the UN Center for Regional Development/DisasterManagement Planning HyogoOffice (UNCRD, Hyogo Office) in Kobe, Japan, inassociation with the Earthquake Disaster MitigationResearch Center (EDM) in Miki, Japan. It focuseson five cities in four countries in Asia: Bandung andBengkulu, Indonesia; Chamoli, India; Kathmandu,Nepal; and Tashkent, Uzbekistan.The objective of the initiative is to develop disasterresilientcommunities through self-help, cooperationand education. The initiative also aims to promote disastereducation among children, teachers and parents.This approach to public education also encourageswidespread involvement in the realization of safer constructionpractices through retrofitting of schoolbuildings with the involvement of the local communities,local governments and NGOs. As a visible andhighly considered community asset, a safer school canserve as a valuable example of practices that can savethe lives of children and serve for relief activities aswell. It can be used as a temporary shelter after anearthquake, and can also promote the culture of preventionand mitigation through ongoing communityactivities.Thus, the importance of schools in every aspect of thedisaster cycle from pre-disaster mitigation to post-disasterrehabilitation can be recognised. Significant successhas been achieved and many important lessonshave been learned, which can and should be applied todifferent hazard-prone cities and countries.In December 2001, the Philippine Institute for Volcanologyand Seismology (PHIVOLCS) and theAsia/Pacific Cultural Center for UNESCO jointlyheld a training course in collaboration with the PhilippineCommission on Higher Education (CHED),United Nations University (UNU) and the AsianDisaster Reduction Center (ADRC). ADRC encouragedparticipation from its member country networkand personnel responsible for education about disastermanagement from 11 Asian countries. The programfor these school commissioners, government educationofficials, and NGO officials included training aimedThe United Nations Disaster Management TrainingProgram (DMTP) has been a major international initiativeto develop training in disaster management.Originally launched by UNDP and UNDRO (nowOCHA) in cooperation with a core group of UNagencies in 1990. DMTP, currently administrated byUNDP, supports ongoing capacity-building efforts ofthe UN system, international organizations and individualdisaster-prone countries. Workshops have promotedthe establishment of national or regional centresand strengthened their capacities to study technologicaland environmental hazards, seismic protection, crisisprevention and preparedness.DMPT has conducted more than 70 workshopsinvolving 6,000 participants in Africa, Latin Americaand the Caribbean, Asia and the Pacific, the MiddleEast and the Commonwealth of Independent States.Training materials include 22 training modules, 27country case studies, simulation exercises, trainers'guidelines, and videos that have been created to implementDMTP's goals. They encompass a wide rangeof topics including learning about emergencies anddisasters, techniques of disaster assessment or riskreduction, links between crisis and development. Thetraining modules have been written in English, Frenchand Spanish, with selected modules translated also intoArabic, Bahasa Indonesian, Chinese, Portuguese,Russian, and Vietnamese. To improve informationexchange and access to all learning resources DMTPestablished a web site at www.undmtp.org.In recognition of the importance of education in disaster reduction,the International Federation of Red Cross and Red CrescentSocieties has devoted significant energy to this area, withactivities including:training geography and social studies teachersas was done in the Caribbean through the Community BasedDisaster Preparedness Programme, so that they may include thetopics in their own classroom plans;• working with tertiary institutions in Pacific island states toincorporate disaster management topics in their curricula;• developing games and drama exercises as a means ofimparting disaster preparedness information to children inthe Pacific;• preparing disaster preparedness manuals for school children,as was done in Vietnam; and• using television cartoons to convey messages to adults andchildren in Central Asian countries.185