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IOM Philippines

Government Delegates of Nepal and IOM Nepal visit the Philippines

March 2015 Newsletter

The week from 24 to 28 February, Nepalese Government Delegates Mr. Shambhu K.C., Director General of the Department of Urban Development and Building Construction and Mr. Krishna Prasad Devkota, Joint Secretary of the Ministry of Home Affairs, together with IOM Nepal Program Coordinator Jitendra Bohara and Program Assistant Prajwal Sharma, visited the Philippines to learn more about IOM Philip-pines’ Camp Coordination and Camp Management and Shelter Response. The study visit was planned for the government officials as part of the “Preparedness and Management of Open Spaces for Effective Hu-manitarian Response in the Kathmandu Valley (P-MOS)” project supported by USAID and OFDA. The pro-ject aims to assist the Government of Nepal in disaster preparedness by improving the capacities and efficiency on the management of open spaces identified for humanitarian purposes in case of disaster. The project thus involves developing public awareness and increasing the response capacities of the Nepalese authorities.

From left: IOM Philippines Camp Coordination and Camp Management Program Manager Conrad Navidad, IOM Philippines Communica-tion with Communities Program Manager Lionel Dosdos, IOM Nepal Program Assistant Prajwal Sharma, IOM Philippines Senior Operations Officer Rex Alamban, Director General of the Department of Urban Development and Building of Nepal Mr. Shambu K.C., Mr. Krishna Prasad Devkota Joint Secretary of the Ministry of Home Affairs, IOM Philippines Shelter Program Manager Maria Moita, IOM Nepal Pro-gram Coordinator Jitendra Bohara © IOM 2015

IOM Mission in the Philippines

IOM Mission in the Philippines

Field visit Guiuan The Nepalese delegates visited Guiuan in Eastern Samar, to witness how the Municipality coped with Typhoon Haiyan’s impact and how IOM and the hu-manitarian community provided support to the gov-ernment and affected population. They visited the Cogon transitional site where 135 transitional shel-ters were built by IOM with funding from the De-partment of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD). These transitional shelters are part of the 3,200 transitional shelter units being built in the provinces of Leyte and Eastern Samar which bore the brunt of the typhoon. The Nepalese guests saw how the shelter units featured ‘build-back safer’ construction techniques making the structures more resilient to strong winds, providing protection to the residents. They also took note of how the site plan, WASH and communal facilities were es-tablished strictly based on the SPHERE standards.

Tacloban Their courtesy visit to the local Chief Executive of Tacloban, Mayor Alfred Romualdez, provid-ed them with a glimpse of the challenges en-countered by the Local Government Unit (LGU) during the early phase of the emergency response. The delegation also visited Ground Zero in Tacloban, the village that was heavily destroyed by Typhoon Haiyan’s storm surge and interacted with the village captain of Ani-bong. They also went to see the transitional shelters built by IOM in collaboration with in-ternational and local NGOs intended for the affected families that were staying in tents lo-cated in danger zones, while awaiting transfer to permanent. They concluded the day by lis-tening to the CCCM and Shelter programme presentations of the Tacloban staff.

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IOM Mission in the Philippines

Meetings in Manila

Romina Sta. Clara, Protection Programme Manager provided essential component of mainstreaming protec-tion while Lionel Dosdos briefed the delegation on the role of communicating with communities in the hu-manitarian response. Conrad Navidad and Mark Maulit presented the CCCM programme with capacity devel-opment as a key feature in providing support to the local government duty bearers and stakeholders.

Department of Social Welfare and Development The meeting at the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD), National Capital Region Office at Legarda, Manila was with Ms. Vilma Cabre-ra, Assistant Secretary for the Protective Pro-grammes and Operations Group. Asec. Cabrera shared her views and experiences especially on the Typhoon Haiyan response. She also affirmed the val-uable partnership with IOM and mentioned the past and current collaboration with IOM in the area of emergency response and ongoing CCCM capacity development assistance provided to DSWD counter-parts and staff members.

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IOM Manila In Manila, the Nepalese delegates met with Marco Boasso, IOM Philippines Chief of Mission who welcomed them together with Rex Alamban, Senior Operations Officer and the Programme Managers extending his support to the delegation and hoping this visit could give them a significant learning experience. The Nepal delegates had a formal orientation with Emergency Preparedness and Response Unit Programme Managers. Rex Alamban presented the best practices of the Haiyan humanitarian re-sponse, followed by Maria Moita who gave a presentation on the shelter programme including questions and answers regarding safer shelter construction techniques and trainings.

International Organization for Migration (IOM) Mission in the Philippines

28F Citibank Tower

8741 Paseo de Roxas Makati City, Philippines 1226

Tel: +63 2 230 1999 | Fax: +63 2 848 1257 | E-mail: iomphilippines@iom.int | www.iom.int

Office of Civil Defense Deputy Director Romeo Fajardo welcomed the Nepalese delegates and key Civil Defense offi-cials gave a briefing on the Philippines’ Nation-al Disaster Risk Reduction and Management system. Through the briefing, the delegates learned about the agencies under the system that are responsible for providing durable shel-ter solutions for displaced families. This was of particular interest to them as they are set to implement a project for managing open spaces pre-positioned for use as evacuation sites in times of emergency. Director General Shambhu K.C. of the Nepalese Department of Urban Development and Building Construction thanked the Office of Civil Defense for the in-formative briefing and invited them to visit Ne-pal to learn in turn what they are doing there along the lines of Disaster Preparedness.

At the end of the study visit, Mr. Shambhu K.C. commended IOM Philippines’ achievement and ongoing practices on disaster preparedness and response. “It was a fruitful experience because we learned from IOM Philippines how to man-age on the field level the CCCM and Disaster Re-sponse. How IOM Philippines managed the dis-aster responses is great. We hope that we con-tinue to get knowledge from the mission and it will be helpful for our colleagues in Nepal. It will be helpful for them to look at and learn from what your mission has done.”

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