The course aspires to provide training on earthquake and tsunami vulnerability reduction strategies, know-how for the development of organized approaches for earthquake and tsunami vulnerability reduction, knowledge and skills for implementation of Earthquake and Tsunami mitigation initiatives.

The course builds on past and enduring endeavors such as Earthquakes and Megacities Initiative (EMI), UN, IDNDR, ISDR initiative for Risk Assessment Tools for Diagnosis or Urban Areas against Seismic Disasters (RADIUS) and Global Earthquake Safety Initiative (GESI) launched by UNCRD , the Geo-Hazard International and from the rich lessons learnt and experiences from the Kathmandu Valley Earthquake Risk Management Project (KVERMP) under the Asian Urban Disaster Mitigation Program (AUDMP) of ADPC.

This course is particularly useful for those concerned with reduction of vulnerabilities to earthquake and tsunami in the urban areas. Thus, the participants are targeted from:

• National level ministries, departments and institutions dealing with urban planning development, housing, infrastructure, public works, utilities, waterworks, drainage, etc.

• Administrators and officials from provincial and city administration, development and

• planning authorities

• Private sector corporations, builders, infrastructure developers, insurance companies

• and others

• Elected representatives from cities and towns

• UN agencies and organizations working on earthquake and tsunami mitigation

• Advocacy and public awareness campaigners, etc.

The course cover the following subjects:

• Overview on Urbanization, Urban Hazards, Vulnerabilities, Risk and Disaster

• Management

• Earthquake Vulnerabilities

• Methodologies on Earthquake Hazard and Risk Assessment

• Earthquake Vulnerabilities Reduction Methods

• Planning for Vulnerability Reduction of Tsunami and Earthquake

• Implementation of Vulnerability Reduction Programs

The first course on EVRC (EVRC-1) was conducted in Kathmandu as a collaborative event between ADPC, NSET-Nepal, WSSI (World Seismic Safety Initiatives) and EMI (Earthquake Megacities Initiative). The second course (EVRC-2) was conducted in November 2002 in Kathmandu as a collaboration between ADPC, NSET-Nepal, WSSI, EMI , ITC-The Netherlands and ICIMOD (Integrated Center for Mountain Development). EVRC-3 was conducted in Dhaka Bangladesh in collaboration with BRAC University and the fourth course (EVRC-4) was carried out in Jakarta, Indonesia on November 2004 with EMI, WSSI and the YIPD/CLGI. The fifth EVRC was conducted in Phuket, Thailand in September 2005 in collaboration with NGI (Norwegian Geotechnical Institute). In September 2006, the sixth training was carried out in Bangkok, Thailand with ITC the Netherlands with more focus on the use of spatial Geo-data. Several EVRC courses were conducted at national-level, such as in Chittagong, Bangladesh in March 2006 in collaboration with CARE Bangladesh, in August 2006 in Jogjakarta, Indonesia in collaboration with Research Center for Disaster of the Gadjah Mada University (UGM). The most recent one was conducted in June 2007 in Dhaka, Bangladesh collaborating with CARE Bangladesh and Bangladesh Earthquake Society.

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