Mexico promotes a joint effort to cope with the region's natural disasters

SRE-SEGOB (Secretary of Foreign Affairs) Joint Press Release

A Technical Advisory Group for the establishment of a simplified regional plan for emergency response and related disaster contingencies was created in the Foreign Ministry in order to implement the mandate of the 17th Iberoamerican Summit that was held in Santiago, Chile in November 2007.

The group will develop a simplified plan to cope with natural disasters in the region by coordinating efforts and resources and by establishing a comprehensive strategy to strengthen national, subregional and regional efforts in order to move from simply reacting to a generalized, proactive response involving mitigation, attention and prevention.

The meeting was headed by the Foreign Ministry´s Department for Technical and Scientific Cooperation of the Economic Relations and International Cooperation Unit and by the Interior Ministry´s Department for Civil Protection.

Participating in the meeting were representatives of the Association of Caribbean States (ACS); the Spanish Agency for International Development Cooperation (AECI); the Andean Committee for Disaster Prevention and Response (CAPRADE); the International Strategy for Disaster Reduction (ISDR ); the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA); the Organization of American States (OAS); the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO); the Special Meeting on Socio-natural Disaster Risk Reduction, Defense, Civil Protection and Humanitarian Assistance (MERCOSUR-REUH); the Iberoamerican Secretariat General (SEGIB); the Latin American Economic System (SELA); and the Union of South American Nations (UNASUR).

It was agreed that the Mexican government would lead the coordination of the Working Group through the pertinent Mexican departments. Furthermore, the international agencies agreed to participate actively and to meet when asked to do so by the coordinating area, taking existing capacity into account and promoting its improvement through their own efforts.

In order to launch the group, the Mexican government will draft a proposed strategy for its establishment which it will send to the member agencies of the Group, as well as those interested in participating, for their input in order to put together a consensus document.

This is the fourth meeting that has taken place on this initiative. The first was held on September 24-25, 2008 in Mexico City, followed by two seminars: one held in Caracas, Venezuela on September 3-4, and the other in Panama City, Panama on October 15-16, 2009. The Panama City seminar led to the coordination of activities carried out in other forums and organizations, with the goal of avoiding a duplication of efforts and the fragmentation of resources.

A number of meetings will be held this year to delineate the group's work so that it begins to produce tangible results in no more than a year.