IFRC* - Choreographer of Disaster Management: Preparing for Tomorrow’s Disasters

The case illustrates the efforts of the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent (IFRC) in the area of emergency response preparedness. It provides an anecdotal description of IFRC’s failure in promptly responding to the 1998 Hurricane Mitch disaster that swept through Central America. It then proceeds in describing how the disaster triggered off IFRC’s pilot initiative, the Pan-American Disaster Response Unit, as well as general awareness on the need to institutionalize preparedness by leveraging on five different “resources”: people, knowledge, goods, money, and the humanitarian community.

The case provides a response and an alternative on how IFRC can improve its disaster response performance. It is a logical sequel to the “IFRC – Choreographer of Disaster Management: The Gujarat case”, discussing how to build preparedness to allow for a much better response when a disaster suddenly strikes somewhere on the globe.