GIDM

For long we have been taught that disasters are of two types, natural and man-made. Isn’t it? But very few of us are aware that, according to recent developments based on years of research, it has been proved that disasters cannot be natural?

We are often taught that earthquakes, cyclones are examples of disasters. But imagine if there’s an earthquake and no one is hurt or no buildings are damaged, should we still call that earthquake a disaster? Events like earthquake, cyclones become a disaster when it combines with EXPOSURE and VULNERABILITY to cause loss of life, hurt and injury to people, along with economic loss. But are we trained enough to see a disaster as a combination of factors like hazard, exposure, vulnerability and coping capacity?

Mami Mizutori, Special Representative of the Secretary-General for Disaster Risk Reduction of United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction (UNDRR) says that “it is a time to say Goodbye to ‘natural’ disaster. A natural hazard becomes a disaster when it combines with exposure and vulnerability to cause loss of life, hurt and injury to people, along with economic loss. Efforts to replace the term “natural disasters” have been underway since the end of the International Decade for Natural Disaster Reduction in the ‘90s.” Available on https://www.preventionweb.net

In fact, we use the term ‘disaster’ so casually, but many of us are unaware that the word disaster has a legal definition in India.

Disaster Management (DM), as a subject and a field of practice, has undergone phenomenal changes in the last decade or so. Unfortunately, not much these changes have been implemented or realised in our society. One of the major reason is the fact that there is a lack of awareness about the fundamentals of the subject. It is often said that a single disaster can push back years of hard earned development and yet, we fail to see disaster and development as the two different faces of the same coin.

Realising this evident gap between what we are taught and what is actually understood globally in this continuously evolving field and with an intention to spread awareness so that our society is capable enough to manage disaster risks and not merely manage disasters, the Gujarat Institute of Disaster Management (GIDM) has developed this 5 hours basic course on Disaster Risk Management (DRM).

The course is composed of 3 learning units which has videos, transcripts of the videos, assorted reading materials and assignments.

Unit 1: Understanding Disaster Risk

The 1st session of Unit 1 introduces the participants to the basic terminologies like Hazard, Exposure, Vulnerability, Coping Capacity etc. and their meaning.

The 2nd session discusses the concept of Disaster Risk and connects it with established definitions like Disaster, Disaster Management etc.

Unit 2: Understanding Disaster Risk Management

Unit 2 discusses the basics of Disaster Risk Management, which is well known as the Disaster Cycle or Disaster Management Cycle. The Unit explains terminologies like Prevention, Mitigation, Preparedness, Response, Recovery etc.

Unit 3: State of Affairs of Disaster Risk Management

The 1st session of Unit 3 discusses the evolution of the field of disaster management, emphasising on the shift from ‘managing disasters’ to ‘managing disaster risks’. This session, primarily, talks about the global scene of evolution and the state of affairs of DRM machinery at the global level.

The 2nd session deliberates on the machinery of DRM in India as well as in the state of Gujarat.

The details of the course is available on GIDM’s portal, at https://gidm.gujarat.gov.in/en/learning-management-system. The glimpses of the course is available on the same page and also on YouTube at https://youtu.be/-SbVrUnSQag.

• To enroll, you would need to register yourself by clicking on the ENROLL NOW button on the page. This will take you to the Learning Management System (LMS) of GIDM. You would be required to create a new account by clicking on ‘Don't have an account? Create one’ and you would be directed to the Course Registration Page.
• After successful registration, you would receive an e-mail with your username (which is the email address that you used for registration) and password.
• To start the course, you would then be required to access (log-in) the LMS at https://gidm.lms.gov.in/default.aspx , with your username and password.
• Once you have logged-in, click on the course titled “Basics of Disaster Risk Management”. This would take you to the Course Page, where you would be able to see all the content of the course like videos, reading materials, transcripts of each session etc.
• The course has 3 units with assessments at the end of each unit. You would have to go through the assessments after each unit to start the next unit.
• After the completion of the course, you would receive a completion email on your registered e-mail address and you would also be able to download your Course Certificate from the Course Page on the LMS, at the top left corner.
• Since this is a self-paced course, you can continue the course at any time, from the point where you left, simply by logging-in again at https://gidm.lms.gov.in/default.aspx with your username and password.

In case of queries, you can write to eaapm-gidm@gujarat.gov.in, or, lms-gidm@gujarat.gov.in