PH joins Pacific Partnership 2019 on disaster response
Credit to Author: The Manila Times| Date: Tue, 12 Mar 2019 11:29:45 +0000
THE Philippines will be joining the US at this year’s Pacific Partnership that would focus on disaster response in the region.
Representatives from Washington, the Philippine military, Tacloban City’s local government unit and the Office of Civil Defense were present at the launch on Tuesday.
The US Embassy in Manila said that this would be an “annual maritime operation improving disaster response preparedness, resiliency and capacity while enhancing partnerships between participating nations and civilian humanitarian organizations throughout the Indo-Pacific region.”
Apart from the US and the Philippines, the partnership also includes military and civilian personnel from Australia, Canada, Japan, Malaysia, Peru, South Korea, Thailand and the United Kingdom.
Tacloban City was represented by Mayor Cristina Romualdez while the OCD was represented by Defense undersecretary Ricardo Jalad, who is also the administrator of OCD.
The US, meanwhile, was represented by US Embassy in the Philippines deputy chief of mission John Law and Lt. Gen. Noel Clement for the military, being the commander of the Visayas-covered Central Command.
Clement said on Tuesday that the Pacific Partnership was actually for the LGUs, government agencies and other sectors to boost its response to disasters “without panicking but rather in a calm manner.”
“It is not just the military benefitting, but all sectors involved in disaster response. In return, our foreign partners also learn from our experiences and help in formulating multinational response protocols during disasters,” he said in a text message.
The US, meanwhile, also said that the military men and non-governmental organization volunteers were scheduled to take part in a variety of projects in Tacloban City to include first-aid training, preventive medicine training, various healthcare symposiums, veterinary services, engineering projects, disaster response seminars and a variety of community outreach engagements.
US Capt. Randy Van Rossum, the mission commander for Pacific Partnership 2019, said that this was the partnership’s eighth visit to the country and noted that “each visit is a testament to our enduring partnership and collaborative commitment to improving humanitarian assistance and disaster response in the region.”
Pacific Partnership began in response to one of the world’s “most catastrophic” natural disasters, starting with the 2004 tsunami that devastated parts of South and Southeast Asia.
The partnership will also make stops in the Federated States of Micronesia, Malaysia, Marshall Islands, Thailand, Timor-Leste and Vietnam. DEMPSEY REYES
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