ブックタイトルRecommendations to prepare for future mega-disasters in Japan

概要

Recommendations to prepare for future mega-disasters in Japan

coordinate both the NGOs/NPOs and the individuals in parallel. Thus, it would be morereasonable to establish a body that can coordinate among NGOs and NPOs, separately fromthe volunteer centres. Alternatively, a mechanism needs to be developed to inject necessaryhuman resources that support the community based relief activities and work in closepartnership with the NGO/NPO coordination body as needed.For example, in Ishinomaki, a clear division of labour was agreed between the local Councilof Social Welfare and the Ishinomaki Disaster Recovery Assistance Council in a relativelyearly phase of the disaster response. Whereas the former focused on the management ofindividual volunteers, the latter worked on the coordination and information management ofprogrammes run by NGOs/NPOs. The experience in Ishinomaki, which resulted in aneffective assistance and recovery efforts joined by both the NGO/NPO community and thegovernment authorities, is a good practice that should be considered when designing a futuremodel of coordination.(5) Code of conduct for the assistance programmes implemented by NGOs/NPOsTo date, whether the international standards such as the Sphere standards, that have beenprimarily developed to support humanitarian assistance in the developing countries, can bedirectly applied to the disaster response in Japan has not been thoroughly examined. However,as discussed in the Section 1 of Part I (Establishment and application of national minimumstandards for future disaster response in Japan, building on exiting international norms andstandards), the NGO/NPO coordination body should promote that NGOs and NPOs shouldcomply with these normative standards when they are involved in relief operations.Nevertheless, faced with many emergency situations both in and outside Japan, NGOs andNPOs may have to recruit a significant number of new staff and dispatch them quickly, oftenbefore being able to fully sensitise them with the norms and standards. Few Japanese NGOsand NPOs have established solid financial bases, and most of them struggle with retainingstaff members as part of their preparedness for future disaster response. In other words, manyof them usually operate with a minimum number of staff, while there is not much room leftfor supporting the staff themselves to accumulate knowledge on the international standards,including training. Therefore, ensuring compliance with the norms and standards cannot beleft with the NGOs and NPOs alone; they require additional support in terms of developingguidance materials, providing training, and establishing a monitoring mechanism andaccountability framework.53