Sharing and Learning: Australia and Indonesia Co-Host Regional Workshop on Disaster Response

Australia, in co-operation with Indonesian emergency management authorities, today launched a four day workshop in Yogyakarta on economic damage assessment for regional major disasters.

“Indonesia and Australia have worked closely in support of each other in recent years to respond to natural disasters, including in Aceh, Yogyakarta and during the Victorian bush fires” said Australia’s Ambassador to Indonesia, Mr Bill Farmer. “By co-hosting this workshop, Australia and Indonesia can use that experience of working together to shape a more cohesive regional approach”.

Following the devastating earthquake in China’s Sichuan Province last year, Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd and Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono committed to intensify joint efforts to strengthen the region’s disaster preparedness and management capabilities.

The two Leaders agreed that Australia and Indonesia would host an APEC workshop on damage assessment techniques to harmonise efforts across 21 of the Asia-Pacific region’s key economies.

“Across the region, processes to assess the nature and magnitude of damage caused by disasters are inconsistent. This has the potential to slow and weaken the delivery of targeted and meaningful disaster relief assistance. Improved knowledge about damage assessment systems will facilitate and accelerate communication and responses among aid recipient and aid donor economies in the immediate post-disaster period” said Mr Farmer.

To achieve this, Australia’s Attorney-General’s Department, which is responsible for emergency preparedness and management in Australia, and Indonesia’s National Coordinating Agency for Disaster Management (BNPB) are co-hosting a workshop for top regional disaster response officials in Yogyakarta from 3 to 6 August 2009.

At the end of this workshop, participants will have developed, for APEC economies’ consideration:

common language post-disaster damages assessment techniques and policies, including definition and scope of ‘post-disaster damage assessment’;
greater competencies and skills for the conduct of post-disaster economic analysis;
best practice guidelines for the conduct of post-disaster damage assessments.

“The workshop is critical to building the region’s capacity to respond to disasters – the more accurately we can assess the damages, the better we can tailor our resources” said Mr Farmer.

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