Establishment of Regional
Consultative Committee on Disaster
Management
The Regional Consultative
Committee (RCC) on Disaster Management was
established by the Asian Disaster
Preparedness Center (ADPC) in 2000 and
comprises of members who are working in key
Government positions in the National
Disaster Management systems of countries of
the Asian region. Box 1 highlights the roles
and responsibilities
To date, 26 countries are
represented by 30 RCC Members from Asia and
Pacific regions, namely, Afghanistan,
Bangladesh, Bhutan, Brunei, Cambodia, China,
Georgia, India, Indonesia, Iran, Jordan,
Kazakhstan, South Korea, Lao PDR, Malaysia,
Maldives, Mongolia, Myanmar, Nepal,
Pakistan, Papua New Guinea, Philippines, Sri
Lanka, Thailand, Timor Leste and Vietnam.
Meetings of the Regional
Consultative Committee on Disaster
Management
Annual
meetings of the RCC are convened by the
Government of a host member country in
collaboration with ADPC. The first two
meetings of the RCC were held in Bangkok,
Thailand in November 2000 and October 2001.
The third meeting was hosted by the
Government of India in New Delhi in October
2002. The fourth was hosted by the
Government of Bangladesh in Dhaka in March
2004. The fifth meeting was hosted by the
Government of Vietnam in Hanoi, Vietnam in
May 2005 and the sixth meeting by the
Government of China in Kunming in November
2006.
ADPC serves as the
secretariat to the RCC.
The seventh meeting would be
held in May 2008 hosted by the Government of
Sri Lanka.
RCC Meetings are attended by
more than 50 RCC delegates comprising of
heads of national disaster management
offices from 26 Asian countries and Pacific
region and observers from UN Agencies, donor
and ADPC partners.
Till date all the meetings of
the RCC have been supported by the
Government of Australia.
Structure of the meetings of
the Regional Consultative Committee on
Disaster Management
Each meeting of the RCC has a
special theme as selected by the host
country. Box …. shows the various past
themes of the RCC meetings. In this theme
session of the meeting, presentations are
made by selected member countries, on
achievements, challenges, good practices in
the countries on the said theme.
The meeting also has a
separate session showcasing the
achievements, practices on DRM of the host
country.
Lessons learned by the member
countries from the recent disasters in the
region, in terms of providing response as
well as planning for recovery and
reconstruction are presented at the meeting.
A special session is also
conducted on the progress made on the RCC
program on Mainstreaming disaster risk
reduction into development planning, policy
and implementation in Asia, which was
launched at the fourth meeting of the RCC in
Dhakha, 2004.
In the context of
strengthening regional cooperation, RCC also
has been organizing a special session on
progress on the implementation of the Hyogo
Framework for Action (HFA) in Asia. This
session has been organized in the past in
partnership with UN/ISDR and UNDP.
Apart from the presentations
by the countries, national and regional DRM
programs, several group discussions are also
held on various issues related to regional
cooperation of disaster risk reduction.
