AP-PLAT capacity development programme: Workshop on Development of Local Guidebook on Compound and Cascading Disaster Risk Management (CCDRM) in Bangladesh

Date	26 January 2023
Venue	Hotel Bengal Canary Park, Dhaka, Bangladesh
Language	English and Bengali
Session title	Workshop on the Compound and Cascading Disaster Risk Management in Bangladesh
Agenda	Agenda of Workshop on the Compound and Cascading Disaster Risk Management in Bangladesh
Organizers	Ministry of the Environment, Japan Department of Disaster Management (DDM), Bangladesh Institute for Global Environmental Strategies (IGES) Postgraduate Programs in Disaster Management (PPDM), Brac University

Institute for Global Environmental Strategies (IGES), with the support from Ministry of the Environment Japan (MOEJ), has launched a project for developing the localized guidebook to address complex climate risks, based on the AP-PLAT’s capacity development e-learning course on Compound and Cascading Disaster Risks Management (CCDRM). As a part of this initiative, “Workshop on the Compound and Cascading Disaster Risk Management in Bangladesh” was organized at Dhaka, Bangladesh on 26 January, 2023.

The objectives of the workshop were;

• Introduce partnership initiatives of AP-PLAT and capacity development program including E-learning tool
• Introduce current capacity development program in Bangladesh and understand its vulnerability against disasters
• Understand basic concepts of CCDRM in the context of Bangladesh
• Introduce and gather direct inputs and feedback on the draft guidebook on the CCDR management in terms of its content in national and local perspectives of Bangladesh through group discussion exercise.

Total fifty participants from various institutes including government agencies, non-governmental organizations, research institutes and universities attended the workshop and actively contributed in the discussions.

Summary of the workshop

The Workshop was inaugurated by Dr. Md. Enamur Rahman MP, State Minister, Ministry of Disaster Management and Relief, Bangladesh. Special Guest remarks were delivered by Md Kamrul Hasan ndc, Secretary Ministry of Disaster Management, Bangladesh and Mr. Gen’ichiro TSUKADA, Director, Climate Change Adaptation Office Global Environment Bureau Ministry of the Environment of Japan (MoEJ). Mr. Yasuo Takahashi Executive Director, IGES, Japan and Md. Mijanur Rahman Director General Department of Disaster Management, Bangladesh delivered opening and welcome speech on behalf of IGES and DDM, respectively. Following the opening remarks, Dr. Kei Kurushima from IGES explained about initiatives of AP-PLAT and capacity development program of CCDRM in AP-PLAT. Then Mr. Md. Abdullah Al-Mamun, Director of Research and Training, Department of Disaster Management and Relief, Bangladesh gave an explanation about current capacity development initiatives of disaster management in Bangladesh.
Following the introduction, the purpose of the workshop was explained by Dr. Bijon Kumer Mitra from IGES starting with the explanation of the concept of compound and cascading disaster risk management. The purpose of the workshop was highlighted as (1) Sharing the draft guidebook on the compound and cascading disaster management in Bangladesh and (2) Interactions with experts to get feedback and suggestions on the draft of the guidebook.

The content of the drafted guidebook was explained by Ms. Tunazzina Rahimu from Brac University. The guidebook has following eight chapters:

• Module Introduction
• Directions for Assistance
• Pre-Training Contents
• Pre-Training Idea Assessment
• Training modules
• Post-Training Contents
• Post-Training Idea Assessment
• Training Assessment

There are six sections for the training module, including case studies of CCDRM in Bangladesh. The training module starts with introduction of general discussions on compound and cascading disasters, followed by case studies, which are Cyclone Amphan, Rana Plaza factory collapse incident, chemical explosion in Sitakundu, compound effects of COVID-19 and 2020 floods, and COVID-19.
Following these explanations, participants were divided into six discussion groups to discuss how to enrich the content of the guidebook. Each group was assigned one of the following questions and asked to discuss it for one hour and present their ideas.

1. How do you perceive Compound and Cascading disasters? Describe the characteristics of each disaster.
2. Do you think there’s a direct cause-effect relationship between climate change and Compound and Cascading disasters happening in all around the world? If yes, please justify. If not, please justify.
3. Make a comparative distinction between Compound and Cascading disasters from your own perspective.
4. What can be the possible risk reduction mechanism/framework to alleviate the risk of Compound and Cascading disasters?
5. What is your opinion, what kind of initiatives can be taken from government side in building resilience to the Compound and Cascading disasters in Bangladesh?
6. What is your opinion, what kind of initiatives can be taken from non-governmental organizations and other stakeholders’ side in building resilience to the Compound and Cascading disaster in Bangladesh?
7. What is your opinion, what kind of assistance you expect from academics/ educational institutions in building resilience to the Compound and Cascading disasters in Bangladesh?

Some key points are raised in the group discussions are follows:

• Characteristics of compound disasters are individual and independent from other disasters, have various sources, occur in short term and have massive destruction, and challenging to respond quickly (example: earthquake, flood, fire, lightning, landslide). On the other hand, cascading disasters create secondary or continuous disaster, have single source, sequential, and can be responded with time (example: earthquake followed by tsunami, flood followed by damage of infrastructure).
• Climate change and compound and cascading disasters have no relation with one another by hazards, but may occur subsequently. Compound and cascading disasters are more complexed to manage and unpredictable.
• There should be more research collaborations on CCDRM to be encouraged both in national and international level.
• Guidebook can be designed for volunteers from different educational institutions for being trained on CCDRM so that they could provide introductory trainings to others.
• There should be unified framework to be designed by experts from different backgrounds, in order to cope with various disasters.
• It is important to build a structure of small-scale risk reduction measures by supports from non-governmental organizations.
• In order to develop capacity against disasters, it is important to secure economic resilience, social resilience, institutional development and environmental adjustments.

Although at the beginning, the participants did not fully grasp the definition of CCDRM and what kind of disasters in Bangladesh can be called CCDRM, they were able to recognize through the workshop that this is an important issue that needs to be addressed by different stakeholders. The workshop concluded with the closing remarks from chief guest, Dr. Md. Enamur Rahman MP, State Minister, Ministry of Disaster Management and Relief and special guest, Mr. Md Kamrul Hasan, Secretary, Ministry of Disaster Management and Relief. They called for continued partnerships of Bangladesh and Japan, which both have high occurrences of disasteres.
The discussion and the feedback received at the workshop will be reflected in the guidebook that is scheduled to be published in end of February, 2023.

Related links

• Building resilience to compound and cascading disaster risks
  https://ap-plat.nies.go.jp/adaptation_literacy/resources/e_learning/drr/index.html

(Posted : 16/FEB/2023)