"Where there is no camera, there is no humanitarian intervention,” said Bernard Kouchner, co-founder of Medecins Sans Frontieres who later became the Foreign Minister of France. Disaster managers and relief agencies acknowledge the mass media's key role at times of distress. Yet, the relationship between media practitioners and those managing disasters can often be stressful, difficult and fraught with misunderstandings.

Communicating about disasters sometimes ends up as communication disasters.

How can these mishaps be minimised, so that the power of conventional and new media can be harnessed to create more disaster resilient communities? What value addition can the new information and communication technologies (ICTs) bring in? In this book, media and development professionals from across the Asia Pacific share their views based on decades of experience in covering or managing a variety of disasters – cyclones, droughts, earthquakes, floods, landsli des and tsunamis.

This book is aimed at journalists, disaster managers and civil society groups who want to use information and communication to create safer societies and communities.

I Communicating Tsunami

Some of the region’s leading communicators look back at their p ost-tsunami experiences, drawing insights and lessons.

The 2004 Tsunami: Unfinished Story, by Johanna Son, Director, Inter Press Service – Asia Pacific; A Candle in My Window, by Peter Griffin, Co-founder, South-East Asia Earthquake and Tsunami Blog; Nobody Told Us to Run…, by Chanuka Wattegama, Director - organisational development, LIRNEasia; Children of Tsunami: Documenting Asia’s Longest Year, by Manori Wijesekera and Nalaka Gunawardene, TVE Asia Pacific; Beyond the Disaster News Template, by Joanne Teoh Kheng Yau, senior producer, Channel News Asia, Singapore; Surviving the Tsunami: A Journalist's Story, by Frederick Noronha, freelance writer, journalist and ICT activist, India

II Communicating under duress

Whenever a hazard turns into a disaster o f any kind, journalists and relief workers are among the first to arrive on the scene. But they have very different agendas. Journalists have to access and verify real time information, conform to communication ethics and get their story ahead of the competition. In the information age, disaster managers have to balance their own humanitarian priorities with the need to manage information flows and maintain good relations with the media. Five authors offer their perspectives.

Capturing Nature’s Fury, by Shahidul Alam, Founder, Drik Picture Library, Bangladesh; Stop All the Clocks! Beyond Text: Looking at the Pics, by Max Martin, Journalist and editor of indiadisasters.org; Seeing Disasters Differently: How to Unearth Real Disaster Stories, by Amjad Bhatti, coordinating editor, South Asia Disaster Report 2005; Communicating to Save Lives, by Patrick Fuller, Communications Coordinator, IFRC Tsunami Response in Sri Lanka; Extra Hands in Times of Crisis, by Veronica Balderas, United Nations Volunteers

III Seeking common ground

Information and communication technologies (ICTs) give us unprecedented power to reach more people faster on hazards and disasters. Technology alone cannot deliver this potential – it requires a mix of sociological, cultural and institutional responses by governments, corporate sector and civil society.

This also calls for building or reinforcing 'bridges' between media practitioners and disaster managers who have traditionally been on two sides of a divide. In this section, our contributors offer personal perspectives on harnessing the power of information and communication to save lives, heal broken hearts and help disaster survivors rebuild their lives.

Engaging the Media: A Rough Guide, by A S Panneerselvan, Executive Director, Panos South Asia; Building Bridges: Managers and the Media, by Sanny Jegillos, Rajesh Sharma and Pablo Torrealba, UNDP; Who's Afraid of Citizen Journalists? by Sanjana Hattotuwa, Senior Researcher, Centre for Policy Alternatives, Sri Lanka; Bridging the Long ‘Last Mile’, by Nalaka Gunawardene, Director and CEO, TVE Asia Pacific; Gender and Disasters: Tracing the Link, by Ammu Joseph, independent journalist and author, India; Healing Broken Hearts, Calming Anguished Minds, by Chin Saik Yoon, founder and publisher, Southbound, Malaysia; 'Critical Mass' for Community Disaster Resilience, by Buddhi Weerasinghe, consultant on disaster risk reduction; Digging Under the Rubble, by Kalpana Sharma, independent journalist, India

Appendices include:

· Report of the Brainstorming on 'Communicating Disasters: Building on the Tsunami Experience and Responding to Future Challenges': Bangkok, 21 – 22 December 2006

· Suggested guidelines for more effective engagement of mass media and new media before, during and after disasters

· Short profiles on Reuters AlertNet for Journalists, UN/ISDR Media Network on Disaster Risk Reduction and UN OCHA ReliefWeb

160 pages; 17.3 cm x 24.4 cm

(From nwmindia.org)

Download Communicating Disasters: An Asia Pacific Resource Book

PDF format, 5.4MB, 164Pages.

Edited by Nalaka Gunawardene and Frederick Noronha
Foreword by Sir Arthur C Clarke

UNDP Regional Centre in Bangkok, TVE Asia Pacific
December 2007

Preface:

Information is a powerful tool, especially in a disaster. Media can be an invaluable conduit to alert communities of impending disasters, to update the situation during a disaster, and to profile real-life stories when the rebuilding begins. Media can bring us up close and personal to the site of the disaster, and show us images as they unfold in real time. Journalists have the power to both inspire positive action as well as ignite fear, depending on the nature and content of the stories they shape.

On the second anniversary of the tsunami in December 2006, the UNDP Regional Centre in Bangkok and TVE Asia Pacific organised a meeting on Communicating Disasters: Building on the Tsunami Experience and Responding to Future Challenges. It provided an opportunity for over 30 media professionals, disaster researchers and managers, and development communication specialists from tsunami-affected countries in Asia to take stock of media coverage, personal experiences, issues and lessons learned from the tsunami.

The meeting specifically explored the role of media professionals and their use of information and communication technologies (ICTs). They shared incisive lessons and reflected on their role during the tsunami and its aftermath. Their experiences helped to shape guidelines for engaging the mass media and ICTs for more effective communication before, during and after disasters.

This joint publication of UNDP Asia-Pacific Development Information Programme and TVE Asia Pacific seeks to capture the essence of the discussions and provide a forward-looking insight into the role of the media in disasters. Their personal observations, and in many cases, dramatic participation in covering the tsunami, offer a new perspective on the many facets of journalists’ work.

There are certainly great benefits to be reaped if strengthened understanding and common ground can be forged between different media outlets, government departments and development agencies when disasters strike. This publication is one contribution toward leveraging the reach of the media and ICTs to better inform citizens and save lives.

Elizabeth Fong
Regional Manager
UNDP Regional Centre in Bangkok

Visit Communicating Disasters: An Asia Pacific Resource Book Download Website

Co-publishers:

United Nations Development Programme - Regional Centre in Bangkok

The UNDP has established Regional Centres in Bangkok, and Colombo, as well as a multi-disciplinary Pacific Centre in Suva with focus on the Pacific Islands. A main priority of the Regional Centres is to provide UNDP Country Offices in the Asia and the Pacific with easy access to knowledge through high quality advisory services based on global applied research and UNDP lessons learnt. The second priority is to build partnerships and promote regional capacity development initiatives, which allow UNDP, governments and other partners to identify, create and share knowledge relevant to solving urgent development challenges. The Regional Centre in Bangkok mainly focuses on support to Democratic Governance, Energy and Environment and Crisis Prevention and Recovery.

The Centre also provides support to UNDP country offices in a number of cross-cutting areas, including capacity development, ICT for development, public-private partnerships and mine action. The Regional Centre in Colombo’s primary focus areas are Poverty Reduction with an overarching effort on achieving the Millennium Development Goals and HIV/AIDS.

http://regionalcentrebangkok.undp.or.th/

Television for Education – Asia Pacific

Television for Education – Asia Pacific, trading as TVE Asia Pacific (abbreviated TVEAP), is a regionally operating non-profit organisation engaged in information, education and communication (IEC) activities on a broad range of sustainable development and social justice issues.

Set up in 1996, the organisation has over a decade’s experience in using audio-visual media (television, video and film) and new media (Internet and Web) for development communication. It works closely with television broadcasters, civil society groups and educational organisations across the Asia Pacific to tell authentic and engaging stories of how individuals, communities and countries pursue better lives and a better planet. Its main strategy is to use ‘moving images to move people’.

TVEAP produces and distributes editorially independent, journalistically packaged TV, video and online content on a broad range of topics and issues. TVEAP’s media products are used by broadcast, educational and civil society organisations across the Asia Pacific region for education, awareness, advocacy, training or activist purposes. TVE Asia Pacific is registered as a guarantee company in Sri Lanka, where its office is located. It is governed by an international Board of Directors.

www.tveap.org | www.digits4change.net | www.childrenoftsunami.info | www.savingtheplanet.tv

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