Regional Technical Training Workshop on Flood Risk Assessment, Monitoring and Early Warning
The IGAD region is a hotspot for major disasters such as drought, floods, landslides which had made significant impact on the lives and livelihood of the communities and damage to key infrastructure in the region in the past as well as most recently during March to May, 2018 floods killed hundreds of people and displaced thousands mainly in Kenya, Somalia, Djibouti and Ethiopia. These disastrous events are setback to the sustainable development efforts in the member countries. Earth Observation (EO) and Spatial planning plays an important role in understanding these disastrous events, inter alia, through mapping of hazards and vulnerability, risk profiling at sub national level and more importantly planning (spatial) for preparedness, mitigation, response and recovery efforts.
It is with these background that United Nations Operational Satellite (UNOSAT), GIZ and ICPAC are jointly organizing a one week regional technical training for the member states on the use of Geographic information system (GIS) for Flood Hazard Assessment, Monitoring and Early Warning. This training is designed based on the recommendation from the Regional Technical Training Workshop on Disaster Risk Assessment, Monitoring and early warning held during February 2018 in Mombasa, Kenya where hands on training was provided on drought and to limited extent on flood hazard assessment. The IDDRSI 2nd General Assembly (GA) recommended for an Early Warning and Early Response while, the 4th SC urged PCU to “Support the application and use of existing products such as the Disaster Loss Database and the IGAD Hazard Maps and Atlas to inform and improve programming of IDDRSI.”
The aim of the course is to introduce the participants to the tools available for Earth Observation, spatial planning and flood early warning, along with applying them to understand flood risk, early warning and also rapid flood impact (response) assessment using the data of most recent flood event in East Africa.
At the end of the course, participants should be able to:
- Define concepts and terminologies related to Earth Observation and spatial planning
- Apply basic methods and functions of analysis and mapping flood hazard assessment.
- Develop a spatial plans for flood hazard assessment using earth observation data.
- Explain the different ways of flood hazard monitoring for early action in DRR decision making.
The course is focused on providing insight into various tools available in Earth Observation and spatial planning in relation to flood risk and early warning. On the first day of the training, participants will get familiar with ESRI ArcGIS software while on the second day they will be introduced to spatial planning and flood hazard assessment. On the third day, concepts of flood risk will be introduced and the participants will be given an opportunity to design flood risk strategy for their country. On the fourth day, flood monitoring and early warning will be covered. Towards the end of the training, an opportunity for rapid flood impact (response) assessment of the most recent flood events in Kenya will be given.
This is a full-time, face-to-face course with lectures and GIS lab exercises using local datasets and real case scenarios. This course is divided into four modules. Each module is structured into 4 sessions of 1.5 hour each. The workload during this training is likely to be around 25-30 hours.
The whole course is designed in a way to have a balanced approach between theoretical and practical methodologies, which will enable the participants to gain maximum knowledge on the subject. It will be taught in lecture/discussion formats illustrated with Power Point presentations, live demos, videos, maps, diagrams, field visits, interactive sessions and content on web sites.
The training participants will be selected based on their merit and specialization related to the objectives of this specific training. In consultation with ICPAC, the IDDRSI National focal ministries will nominate two trainees (ONE from Disaster Risk Reduction/Management (DRM), and ONE from the ministry of water and irrigation of the member states). Only selected trainees and their supervisors will be contacted. It is recommended that participants taking this training have a working knowledge of English and a basic knowledge on hydrology, GIS and Remote Sensing technologies.
IGAD’s Climate Prediction and Applications Centre (ICPAC) is a regional centre focussing on improving sub-regional and national capacity for climate information, prediction products and services, early warning, and related applications as a contribution to sustainable development in the IGAD region. ICPAC’s mission consists in providing timely climate early warning information and supporting specific sector applications to enable the region to cope with various risks associated with extreme climate variability and change, for poverty alleviation, environment management and sustainable development. ICPAC’s office is located in Nairobi.
The Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit GmbH (GIZ) is a German development agency headquartered in Bonn and Eschborn that provides services in the field of international development cooperation.