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Strong collaborative partnership that dates back four years – from the Typhoon Haiyan (Yolanda) emergency response in 2013, to the capacity building activities and emergency preparedness planning post-Yolanda in 2014. This describes well Ramon Aboitiz Foundation Inc.’s partnership with the International Rescue Committee (IRC).

“I remember talking with Bobby Aboitiz —  his words resonate well with me, he talked to me about excellent emergency preparedness and response. With this, IRC will be able to journey with RAFI,” commented IRC Regional Deputy Director for Programs (Asia), Sergio Daniel Kristensen.

Kristensen was joined by Soso Bagashvili, the IRC newly installed Regional Emergency Preparedness Coordinator (Asia).

Kristensen and Bagashvili visited RAFI on August 16 for a bilateral meeting about the updating of the existing Memorandum of Understanding (MoU), and updating workshop of the existing RAFI Emergency Preparedness Plan (REPP) which was developed with the IRC’s support in 2015.

MOU Revisited

The existing MoU was reviewed by the IRC’s Kristensen and Bagashvili.  RAFI was represented by Vice President for Social Development Atty. James Abadia, Integrated Development Unit Executive Director Anthony Dignadice, and Chris Estallo, Program Head of the newly established Humanitarian Disaster Preparedness and Response Unit (HDPR).

There were no significant changes identified, however, key priority needs for IRC’s technical assistance to RAFI were identified, namely:

1. Update the existing RAFI EPP

2. Establish RAFI’s Emergency Response Team (RAFI Surge Team) comprised of the existing staffs.

3. Develop an Operations manual for the newly formed HDPR Unit.

4. Economic Wellbeing (EW) programming.

For the EW programming, RAFI is interested in developing a Theory of Change around this area expressed their interest in receiving support from IRC.

REPP Updated

On August 17 and 18, an EPP update workshop was held. 18 cross-program RAFI leaders and staffs, and the City Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Officers (CDRRMO) of Cebu and Lapulapu Cities attended the workshop where related terminologies and concepts were discussed with the staff and contextualised for RAFI.

RAFI’s Emergency Response Team (RAFI Surge Team) structure was developed, with chain of command identified adopting the Philippines’ Incidence Command Center (ICS) framework and structure.

The EPP workshop participants identified their functions of interest on the RAFI’s emergency roster as well as their related experiences. In addition, the RAFI’s ERT ToR was reviewed in the workshop and changes were made to it in order to make it more relevant and functional.

Overall, the visit of IRC, the meetings and workshops are all about strengthening partnerships, benefitting from mutual interests and strengths to build capacities around the Emergency Preparedness and Response (EPR) work, while jointly raising funds for preparedness, response and disaster risk resilience (DRR)/resilience work and to further explore RAFI and IRC’s mutual organizational interests and practicalities.