MAPPING ASEAN’S RESOURCES
TO RESPOND TO DISASTERS
As Resource Mobilisation Manager of the ASEAN Coordinating Centre for Humanitarian Assistance on Disaster Management (AHA Centre), one of Dipo Summa’s jobs is to coordinate the mobilisation of resources in times of disaster.
The AHA Centre was established on 17 November 2011, to facilitate cooperation and coordination of disaster management amongst ASEAN Member States. The coordinating agency is supported by ASEAN Member States as well as external organisations.
‘It is crucial for the AHA Centre to have a tool to map its resources’, Peter Mansson, disaster management expert from the Leveraging ASEAN Capacities for Emergency Response (LACER project) said. ‘It is important to identify gaps and assets of each ASEAN Member State to allow effective response in times of disaster’.
Funded by the EU and implemented by the Swedish Civil Contingencies Agencies (MSB) and the Estonian Rescue Board (ERB), the LACER project is designed to support the AHA Centre in improving its operational capacity and capability in disaster preparedness and management as well as strengthening its institutional capacity.
The project introduced the Disaster Management (DM) Framework developed by Lund University to assess the disaster management capabilities of ASEAN Member States in different areas, as well as that of the AHA Centre. ‘This
framework can facilitate decisions on the allocation of scarce resources as well as cross border and peer-to-peer learning between the different National Disaster Management Organisations in ASEAN’, added Mansson.
‘We found this tool to be very useful and can be applied in other areas as well’, Summa said. The AHA Centre plans to also use the DM framework to develop an online coordination platform and conduct a donor coordination assessment exercise.
