Projects: Working with United Nations and Inter-governmental Organizations (IGOs), UW-Madison Disaster Management Center

Working with United Nations and Inter-governmental Organizations (IGOs)

The UW-DMC has worked on two major, multi-year training projects, both sponsored by the United Nations. Approximately 3,400 individuals, from 125 countries have participated in the Emergency Management Training Program (EMTP), a special training program for refugee emergencies developed at the request of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. In addition, some 3,600 persons from 55 countries have attended more than fifty disaster management training events and learned about disasters and complex emergencies from training materials prepared for the Disaster Management Training Program (DMTP), a global training initiative sponsored jointly by the United Nations Development Programme and the United Nations Department of Humanitarian Affairs.

In 1985, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) (link exits this site) initiated a plan to design and implement the EMTP. This program was designed and has been implemented for more than a decade with assistance from the UW-DMC. The training workshops are designed for mid-career managers from UNHCR, non-governmental organizations (NGOs), governments and other UN system agencies. Participants earn continuing education credits towards the Disaster Management Diploma at the UW-DMC. Since 1985, more than fifty workshops have been run. For 1998, there were regional workshops in Malaysia, South Africa, China and the first Advanced Emergency Management Seminar was held in Switzerland.

In 1990, the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) (link exits this site) and the United Nations Coordinator for Disaster Relief (UNDRO) began the Disaster Management Training Program (DMTP), a program to develop a framework for training on a global scale. The two UN agencies were looking to provide a catalyst for disaster management training in the world's most hazard-prone countries, while at the same time strengthening the capabilities of their own staff. Jointly, UNDP and UNDRO (which then became the United Nations Department of Humanitarian Affairs, and has now become the Office for Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, or OCHA) (link exits this site) asked the UW-DMC to coordinate the development of disaster management training materials, trainer development workshops combined with regional and country workshops for this worldwide project.

For UNHCR, the UW-DMC has also worked with Inter-Works (link exits this site) to prepare and present a concentrated three-day workshop to train staff to become effective trainers. These workshops have been presented in Switzerland and the United States.

The UW-DMC has provided educational assistance to training programs for the World Food Program (link exits this site) (emergency management operations program training in Burkina Faso, Italy, Ivory Coast, Mozambique, Uganda, Zimbabwe), United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (link exits this site) (evaluation of training program for operations in Rwanda), International Organization for Migration (link exits this site) (disaster management training in Tajikistan), United Nations Disaster Assessment and Coordination (UNDAC) (link exits this site) (team training workshops in Denmark, Ecuador, Switzerland and at the UW-DMC), United Nations Staff College (link exits this site) (Workshop on Management of Field Coordination for Senior UN System Representatives-Latin American Region), UNICEF (link exits this site) (Emergency Management and Preparedness Workshop for the Americas and Caribbean Region) and the United Nations Military and Civil Defense Assets (link exits this site) program (training workshops in Austria, Switzerland).

The UW-DMC collaborates with the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) (link exits this site) to administer a scholarship fund for individuals from Latin America and the Caribbean to enroll in self-study courses and the diploma program. For more information, please contact PAHO.

The UW-DMC collaborates with The World Bank (Hazard Management Unit) and the Provention Consortium to manage a global Applied Research Grants program for young professionals in the fields of hazard risk reduction and disaster management. In June 2003, sixty-five individuals and/or teams won grants of up to US$5,000. For more information, check the Web sites for the Hazard Management Unit (link exits this site) and the Provention Consortium (link exits this site). One of the sixty-five projects is discussed in "Natural Disasters: Answering the Call to Aid," (link exits this site) an online article prepared by The World Bank Media Center.