Davos Diary Continued: Heather on Glaciers and Academic Partnerships

1) As is often the case, I suppose, getting an opportunity to get out of one's chair and consider nature while out IN nature is perhaps one of the better ways to learn. The educational excursion on geomorphology of glaciers (day 1) held many important thoughts that clearly applied to DRR work around the world for the 20 intrepid (and soggy) participants. Through the eyes of an experienced alpinist, the glacial morane of the Dischma Valley informs us of risks (avalanches occur at least every 100 years so if you choose to live there, you and your children need to be prepared) and of mitigation through knowledge (don't build your home or your barn at the base of a stream of waterfall coming off the mountains; these act as natural "deltas" carrying rocks, mud vegetation and increasing the probability of landslides). When we as emergency responders walk into new places where a natural disaster has struck, how often are we considering the risks and knowledge offered by the terrain itself? Are we arming ourselves with historic geologic, botanical, scientific knowledge of these areas before we influence the re-building of what has been lost/destroyed? I, for one, certainly came away from this session with the awareness to do so. 2) Wow. Lots of talk. The plenaries were a bit too full of speakers and not terribly well organized to ensure that ideas are not repeated by the full panel. Hopefully, these got better in the final days of the conference... 3) Opportunities for networking abounded both within the conference center and outside. I will surely share contacts with colleagues here at Save the Children who are doing interesting and, in some cases, ingenious work in the areas of emergency and child safety education. Opportunities to talk to our academic partners from universities (around the world) also highlighted for me an important resource that we, as NGOs, are often unable to tap into in a relevant way: able-bodied and able-minded researchers who are anxious to develop the evidence base for the challenges we face in our work and for the results that we seek. The UN has no problem engaging academics to research topics of interest to them. Where is the divide, then, between academic research and the community-based work that we do? Timing and timeliness are two challenges, of course, as research, analysis and documentation of findings is not a fast process -- and we are, after all, responding in emergency settings. Funding is another challenge. But, I learned from several academics that I talked to that they can get the money if we can feed them the ideas and give them the access to the field. But, deep down, I also wonder whether there is an ideological divide that we may need to start breaking down into its component parts so that we can get a better understanding of when and where NGOs and universities can and should be working hand-in-hand.

Heather Danton
Save the Children US ECB3 Advisor