SPC Geoscience Division

Disaster risk management and damage assessment: a training session for those working in those areas in New Caledonia

A disaster risk management and damage assessment training session is being held this week at the Secretariat of the Pacific Community (SPC) Headquarters in Noumea.  It is being run by SPC trainers who are disaster risk specialists and by civil safety officials from Vanuatu and Fiji.

This training programme responds to a request from the New Caledonian Government and is comes within the framework of the French Government’s transfer of powers for the civil protection area to New Caledonian authorities. It is designed to build knowledge about risk prevention/mitigation and post-disaster response.  It also provides a window onto the disaster risk management models that exist in other countries in the region.

Funded by The Asia Foundation and USAID (with the support of the European Union for the session in New Caledonia), over the past 15 years this training course has been held in 14 Pacific countries and territories with more than 7000 participants. The region faces many hazards such as tropical cyclones, flooding and tsunamis, which are often devastating and costly for the Pacific islands, so this training course helps ensure improved disaster risk management.

For further information, please contact: Jean-Noël Royer, SPC Assistant Communications Officer: [email protected], tel. (direct line) 26 01 71: [email protected]