International Workshop for National Disaster Response System

Background and rationale:

Ministry of Public Safety and Security (MPSS) was newly established on 19 November 2014. The goal of MPSS is to cope with all types of disasters and safety problems. To this end, MPSS and UNISDR GETI will convene a two-day workshop on national disaster preparedness and response system on 18-19 March 2015 in Seoul, Republic of Korea. This workshop will bring together experts from disaster response management organizations, research institutes, and academia in USA and Republic of Korea.

The purposes of the workshop are:

1. To provoke dialogue among emergency management experts on disaster preparedness and response system;
2. To share the lessons learned from previous disasters and to secure how those experiences are utilized to improve the emergency management system;
3. To reflect the discussion results on national response policy and framework.

As the international emergency management community is transitioning to sustainable development goals, a more definite and operational concept of resilience before and after disaster is urgently needed. In this context, timely and reliable response to all sorts of disasters whether it is caused by man or by the nature are critical to emergency management and building long-term resilience. As USA and Korea are facing common challenges, the benefits of collaborative efforts for establishing effective coordination among various potential stakeholders are abounding.

Two tragic events, the terrorist attack that took place in New York City on September 11th 2001 and hurricane Katrina that caused a severe damage in Louisiana on August 29 of 2005, had significant impact on the national emergency management community in the USA. Similarly, the sinking of Sewol on the morning of 16 April 2014 en route from Incheon to Jeju had huge impact on the social and political reaction within the Korea. Among many changes in the USA after two major events, National Incident Management System (NIMS), National Preparedness Guidelines (NPG), and National Response Framework (NRF) are three critical progresses. Similar struggles are ongoing in Korea to set up what needs to be identified, what progress needs to be done, and how well the progress needs to be done to manage major disasters.

In this context, it is important to share knowledge between two countries and to sharpen the focus of evidence-based resilience by identifying the key roles and responsibilities of the Nation.

Workshop objected and expected outcomes:

1. Draft Strategies for guiding principles enabling all levels of domestic response partners to prepare for and provide a unified national response to disasters and emergencies.
2. Draft Strategies for coordinating structures of implementation framework at any level and at any time for local and national emergency or disaster response.

Key questions used for in-depth discussions sessions at the workshop:

Session one: National response framework:

1. National Response Framework is composed of Main Part, Emergency Support Function, Support Annex and Incident Annex. What is the role of each part? How is each part related?
2. How does FEMA or your organization improve the close relations between primary agency and secondary agency in the ESF? If the secondary agencies do not corporate with the primary agencies, what is the penalty for doing the corporation?
3. How does FEMA or your organization link NRF with disaster response plan (or Emergency Operation Plan) at state and local levels? Do FEMA, state government and local government develop SOP for personnel and organization to implement NRF and EOP?
4. What kind of incident scenarios has FEMA or your organization developed to implement NRF? 5. Implementation Mechanism: NRF – EOP - SOP

Session two: National incident management system

1. How do local government and state government relate ICS in the field with ESF in the EOC?
2. How does local government implement ICS when several disasters occur simultaneously (e.g. hurricane)?

Session three: training, exercise, and evaluation

1. How does FEMA or your organization evaluation core capabilities of personnel, organizations, and network in line with disaster preparedness and response?
2. How do you call up the capability and resources of public and private sectors, the semi- or non-government parts in disaster management? How do you maximize the use of public and private sectors? Can you provide the representative failure experiences? What are the solutions and approaches of overcoming obstacles or barriers?
3. Does FEMA or your organization have the generalized or specialized evaluation models and procedures for education, training and exercise of disaster management?