From June 12th-15th, the Community Based Capacity Building Training Course, a key activity of “Community Based Disaster Management in Asia Project (CBDM Asia) Phase II”, was held in Mymensingh city, Bangladesh. The training course was co-hosted by the Ministry of Civil Affairs of China (MCA) and UK Department for International Development (DFID), and organized by National Disaster Reduction Center of China (NDRCC) of MCA, the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and the Government of Mymensingh city. Around 37 participants attended the training course, including government officials, experts from NDRCC, UNDP Bangladesh, Mymensingh Municipality and Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology (BUET) and community representatives of Ward 14, Mymensingh. The two-day training focused on three issues: “Community Disaster Risk Identification, Assessment and Mapping”, “Community/Family Emergency Material Allocation”, and “Disaster Information Sharing and Service Platform”. Through theoretical lectures, hands-on practice, field training, emergency material demonstration, Q&A discussion and other training forms, local trainees have learned theoretical and practical knowledge in the participatory training.

On the morning of June 13, Ms. Guan Yan, Director of International Cooperation Department, National Disaster Reduction Center of China (NDRCC) of MCA of China, Asif Hossain Don, Panel Mayor -01 of Mymensingh Municipality，Arif Abdullah Khan, Disaster Resilience Programme Specialist of UNDP Bangladesh, and Md. Rafiqul Islam Miah, Executive Engineer of Mymensingh Municipality, attended the opening ceremony on June 13th and delivered speeches.

After the opening ceremony, the risk mapping research team introduced the method of community disaster risk identification and mapping from the following five steps as basic data preparation, evaluation unit division, on-site information collection, community disaster risk assessment and community disaster risk mapping, and then elaborated the marking of risk map elements. In the afternoon, the trainees were divided into five groups and went to the five evaluation units of Ward14 community to carry out household survey and risk information collection, to get more information about the local hazards, emergency shelters, evacuation routes and risks level of buildings, etc. After completing risk information collection, the risk mapping training team has given further elaboration on risk grading and mapping and held Q&A discussion with trainees about the difficulties they met during risk collection and mapping. 

At the same time, the emergency materials research team and information platform research team carried out site investigation in Ward 14 to further collect information on local disaster situation, current supply of emergency materials and the deployment environment of information platform, etc.

On the morning of June 14th, the emergency materials research team first introduced the principles of community / family emergency material allocation and the draft list of emergency supplies recommendations in Bangladesh, and then presented the function, characteristics and necessities of each emergency item in the form of physical presentation combined with picture display. After that, the trainers discussed with the Bangladesh trainees about the allocation status and needs of these emergency items in the local community and families and collected their suggestions for the emergency supplies list.

Afterwards, the information platform research team gave a detailed presentation about the functions and operation of Disaster Information Sharing and Learning Platform (website and APP versions). Trainees downloaded the APP to their cell phones to practice, gaining first-hand and intuitive experience of the modules and contents of the information platform. The research team also gave professional training to the local IT technical staff on system operation.

In the Closing Ceremony, trainees received the training certificates and some were invited to share their experiences and suggestions about the training. Then the National Disaster Reduction Center of Ministry of Civil Affairs of China presented the family emergency supplies kit to the representative of Mymensingh Municipality.

During the training, Chinese mission held work meetings with Mr. A.K.M Tariqul Alam, Chief Executive Officer of Mymensingh Municipality to discuss the local application of project outcomes and exchanged opinions with Mr. Md. Ekramul Haque Titu, Mayor of Mymensingh Municipality. The Risk Mapping research team and Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology shared the methodology and progress of risk mapping of each side for potential collaboration. 

This training is one of the best practices of National Disaster Reduction Center of Ministry of Civil Affairs of China in overseas practical training. The training team gathered a lot of information about the local context and the trainees and made targeted adjustment in the training program and methods, getting fully prepared before the training. To accommodate the needs of trainees in terms of language and disaster management knowledge, English-Bengali interpretation and translation was provided throughout the training and all the sessions were designed in an interactive and practical way, so as to ensure the best possible delivery of knowledge and skills. After the training, the training team collected evaluation feedbacks and suggestions from trainees to further improve the research outputs. This training has verified that project outputs are both practical and applicable. It is an opportunity for China and Bangladesh to share more on DRR technologies and consolidate the partnerships for future collaboration.