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Living with Risks: Sharing Knowledge on Disaster Preparedness
in the Himalayan Region
There is a growing concern within the international community to improve disaster management and preparedness. As a response, ICIMOD has initiated work on collating important information about disaster preparedness in the region through a project titled ‘Living with Risks – Sharing Knowledge on Disaster Preparedness in the Himalayan Region’. The specific objective of the project is to support key practitioners with current knowledge in the field of disaster preparedness; mainly; floods, landslides and earthquakes; and build capacity in multi hazard risk assessment, as well as providing a platform for interaction and exchange of experiences. The prime target countries for the project are Bangladesh, India, Nepal and Pakistan.
The project builds on ICIMOD’s several years of dedicated deliberations and knowledge building towards reducing the vulnerabilities of mountain communities. The project proposal is taking off from the “‘Hyogo Framework for Action 2005-2015” – a comprehensive document promoting a strategic and systematic approach to reduce vulnerabilities and risks to hazards, which was developed at the ‘World Conference on disaster reduction’ in Kobe, Japan in January 2005. This document identifies that “there is a need to enhance international and regional cooperation and assistance in the field of disaster risk reduction’ through ‘use of knowledge, innovation and education to build a culture of safety and resilience at all levels”.
Within this project ICIMOD intends to:
- compile a synthesis of the current knowledge in the field of disaster management and preparedness, including indigenous knowledge;
- promote exchange of experiences, best practices and cross-learning between practitioners through the arrangement of two regional workshops and the establishment of a website as the basis for knowledge networking; and
- strengthen the capacity to perform multi-hazard risk assessment and hazard mapping by providing two training courses on “earthquake vulnerability and multi-hazard risk assessment”.
The project is supported by the European Commission Humanitarian Aid Department (DG ECHO) and will be implemented between 1 April 2006 and 30 June 2007.
Further information:
For enquiries in relation to the project, please contact Dr Mats Eriksson (meriksson@icimod.org) or Mr Vijay Khadgi (vkhadgi@icimod.org) at Water, Hazards and Environmental Management, ICIMOD, tel. +977 1 55 25 313.
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