PREANDINO
Tanya Miquilena de Corrales, Regional Coordinator
tecorrale@caf.com

PREANDINO’s Second Regional Meeting

The Regional Andean Programme for Risk Reduction and Disaster Prevention (PREANDINO) held its second meeting on 4-6 July 2001 in Quito, Ecuador. It was sponsored by the Andean Development Corporation (CAF), which has supported the initiative from the start. A total of 110 participants, 45 of them high-level experts, came together from all of PREANDINO’s member countries: Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru and Venezuela.

These meetings serve as a forum for national and sectoral development and disaster reduction institutions to exchange experiences on their efforts to promote emergency and disaster prevention, mitigation, preparedness and response.

During the event, country representatives discussed their national and sectoral plans for risk reduction and the institutional strengthening required to carry them out. Among the sectors examined were higher education, agriculture, transportation, and human settlements.

One of the key achievements of the meeting was the production of a First Plan for Horizontal Cooperation among member countries in the sectors mentioned above. The Plan, which covers technical assistance, the exchange of information, technical exchange visits, methodologies and training, is being presented to the international community in the hope of attracting funding.

The Insertion of PREANDINO in the United Nations International Strategy for Disaster Reduction (UNISDR)

Taking into account the mechanisms contemplated in the ISDR, participants at the meeting agreed that the national platforms for risk reduction and disaster prevention that have been set up or strengthened within the PREANDINO framework be the ISDR focal points for subregional cooperation and integration.

In addition, Andean countries are cooperating in the gathering of data for the ISDR World Report, an upcoming publication that will describe the status of disaster reduction around the world.

PREANDINO’s Third Regional Meeting

PREANDINO’s Third Regional Meeting will be held on 28-30 November 2001 in Bogota, Colombia. It is expected to bring continuity to the exchange of disaster reduction experiences among Andean countries.

In addition to reviewing national plans, discussions will be held on water and sanitation, health, education, and energy. The goal is to complete the Horizontal Cooperation Plan developed during the second meeting by incorporating these new sectors.

The choice of the host country reflects Colombia’s recent advances in several of the fields to be discussed during the meeting, enabling participants to gain first-hand experience of these efforts.

The meeting is also expected to reinforce institutional strengthening and capacity building at the regional level through the development of a strategy specifically for that purpose, now that the initial stage of setting up national platforms has been completed.