PDC Updates | May 22, 2009
Christina Finch
At the International Training Workshop on Natural Disaster Reduction, participants were encouraged to share with each other. Here, Heng Aik Cheng of Mercy Malaysia, left, looks on as Emento Hipolito Cruchaga Mercedes of Instituto Nacional de Defensa Civil, Peru, explains mudslide hazards in his mountainous country to PDC’s Christina Finch.

The National Science Council of Taiwan hosted the 2009 International Cooperation on Research and Training Programs in order to enhance collaboration in the areas of science and technology, particularly within developing countries. As part of this program, Director Liang-Chun Chen of Taiwan’s National Science and Technology Center for Disaster Reduction (NCDR) invited representatives from nine countries to join experts from Taiwan agencies in a week-long discussion of disaster reduction methodologies.

Chris Chiesa
Approximately 30 people from both sides of the Pacific, most of them governmental agency officials, were invited to attend the workshop and share their experience on disaster impacts and response. Pacific Disaster Center Chief Information Officer Chris Chiesa and two specialists, Senior Risk Assessment Analyst Christina Finch and Disaster Management Applications Analyst Andrea Chatman, represented the United States at the conference. The other nations participating in the networking, training and information sharing were Vietnam, Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Thailand, Guatemala, Peru and Nicaragua, each sending two to four experts.

The PDC staff and their presentations were well received. Chiesa provided an overview of PDC, its programs and capabilities including the APNHIN information sharing network, Finch spoke about socio-economic vulnerability metrics, and Chatman presented flood modeling applications to risk assessment and mitigation.

« PDC CIO Chiesa addresses the concepts of risk assessment and early warning as two key pillars in PDC’s disaster risk reduction program.

Andrea Chatman
PDC analyst Andrea Chatman and Dr. James Jang of NCDR’s Flood and Drought Division practice some of the workshop’s signature information sharing.

More information about these topics is available online:

  • Taiwan’s National Science and Technology Center for Disaster Reduction (NCDR)
  • NCDR’s International Training Workshop on Natural Disaster Reduction (ITW 09)
  • Partnership between Pacific Disaster Center and NCDR formalized in December 2008.
  • Delegates from NCDR visit PDC’s Maui headquarters.
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