4. Human Resource Development

4-2. Seminars and Training Course
4-2-1. JICA Training Course: “Comprehensive Disaster
Management for Central Asia and Caucasus”
ADRC conducted a training course for disaster management officials from Central Asia andthe Caucasus from 23 June to 2 August 2014 with cooperation from the Japan International
Cooperation Agency (JICA) Kansai International Center. Central Asia and the Caucasus
frequently experience disasters such as earthquakes, floods and landslides, some of which
extend across several countries. Also, heavy snowfall in winter can lead to flooding when
mountain glaciers thaw in the warmer seasons. Thus, these regions have common concerns interms of disaster risk management.
This course aims to convey basic knowledge and experiences related to natural disastermanagement, and to further promote the implementation of the Hyogo Framework for Action(HFA) in the trainees' countries. Trainees were asked to identify a major problem in their own
countries and to formulate an action plan for addressing it.
The course was conducted in Russian, with 13 central and local government officials
representing six countries: Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan,
Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan in Central Asia, andArmenia and Azerbaijan in the Caucasus. Participants
attended lectures and visited central and municipal
government

agencies,

research

institutes,a

meteorological organization, a disaster management
base, private companies, and a UN office in order tocomprehensively enhance their understanding of thedisaster management system. They also participated incommunity activities, such as “Town Watching,”
which involved hazard map making, and went on anexcursion to Niigata where landslide and erosion
control countermeasures are being implemented. Inaddition, they visited Sendai-city and Natori -city, allof which were affected by the Great East Japan

Fig. 4-2-1-1 Millennium Hope Hills,
Iwanuma City

Earthquake, to see how recovery is progressing and todiscuss lessons learned.
It is hoped that the participants will make good use of the knowledge, technologies, andmethods they learned during this training course to implement various projects and help
strengthen the disaster management systems in their home countries. ADRC would like toexpress its sincerest gratitude to all the organizations that contributed to the success of thiscourse.

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4-2-2. JICA Training Course: “Comprehensive Disaster Risk
Management Course”
From 5 January to 21 February 2014, ADRC, in collaboration with JICA conducted the JICA
Comprehensive Disaster Risk Management Course for 10 countries, namely Bhutan, Burundi,Indonesia, Mongolia, Myanmar, Philippines, Tajikistan, Macedonia, Cuba and Malaysia.
Sixteen government officials in charge of disaster management took part in the training. Thiscourse aimed to help participants formulate and further develop disaster management plans intheir own countries based on the concept of total disaster risk management, by enhancing theirunderstanding of the disaster management systems adopted by the central and local
governments of Japan.
During the training, participants attended a series of lectures on such topics as the Japanesedisaster management system at the central and local levels, Japanese measures against
earthquake, flooding, landslides and volcanic eruptions, school disaster education,community-based disaster risk management, the role of the media in disaster risk reduction, andrecovery from natural disasters. They participated in a drill conducted by a Disaster Prevention
Welfare Community in Kobe, the ADRC’s town watching exercise, and the Memorial Walk of
the Great Hanshin-Awaji Earthquake, in addition to visiting disaster-affected areas of the Great
East Japan Earthquake and Mt. Unzen Fugen’s volcanic eruption.
The trainees showed great interest in Japanese disaster management systems and efforts at
disaster risk reduction and were keen to learn from every lecture and exercise offered during
this training course. It is hoped that the participants will make good use of the knowledge andmethods they learned during this training course to help strengthen the disaster management
systems in their home countries.

Fig. 4-2-2-1 town watching

Fig. 4-2-2-2 unmanned construction system ofMt. Unzen Fugen’s area36

4. Human Resource Development

4-2-3. JICA Training Course: “Raising Awareness of DisasterReduction”
The Asian Disaster Reduction Center (ADRC) conducted a training course for disastermanagement personnel of administrative and research institute in the developing country for
purpose of raising awareness of disaster reduction in their country as the following.
The training was designed to develop an action plan and to implement it for raisingawareness of disaster reduction among the citizens of those countries.
The ultimate goal is to ensure that the general public will be able to acquire the knowledge
needed for disaster reduction, conduct preparedness and emergency response activities, andminimize damage during a disaster.
(1) Raising Awareness of Disaster Reduction (A)This training was conducted for 10 disaster management officials from Vietnam byVietnamese language from 24 June to 25 July 2014.
Trainees attended lectures and visited central and municipal government agencies, disastermanagement bases, educational institutions, a meteorological organization, a broadcasting
company, and NPOs in order to enhance their understanding of Japan's disaster management
system and techniques.
Especially, they had a chance to visit a“rice field dam” which serves to control
outflows of water from rice fields using aboard. This was introduced as a good
example of how an immediate effect can beachieved even on a limited budget, which isimportant for Vietnam, where floods cause
major natural disasters.
The trainees were excited to utilize what
they learned in Japan to contribute to efforts

Fig. 4-2-3-1 rice field dam

aimed at promoting disaster risk reduction in
their own country in the final presentation of their action plan.
(2) Raising Awareness of Disaster Reduction (B)This training was conducted for 12 disaster reduction personnel from the following 6countries, Brazil, Chile, Honduras, Myanmar, Papua New Guinea, Philippines and Samoa byEnglish from 6 January to 6 February 2015.
Trainees attended lectures and visited central and municipal government agencies, disastermanagement bases, educational institutions, a meteorological organization, a broadcasting
company, and NPOs in order to enhance their understanding of Japan's disaster management
system and techniques.

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Particularly, they were impressed with the quick and exact primary information sharing
under the collaboration between the Meteorological Agency, NHK(Japan Broadcasting
Association), Newspaper Company and Mobile Internet Company, regarding early warning
system.
The trainees were very interested in the efforts of disaster reduction in Japan and eagerly
participated every lecture and observation and finally made presentation of action plan for own
country.

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