AHA Centre Response within ASEAN

to early, anticipatory action. Ensuring interconnectivity of disaster monitoring platforms in the region with the AHA Centre’s platform. Exploring new innovations in hazard monitoring to ensure better accuracy and faster response. • Knowledge and Outreach - Facilitating and promoting the exchange of expertise and knowledge, capability strengthening, and influencing and disseminating ASEAN best practices and lessons learned to bolster regional capacity and national leadership and contribute to global leadership on DM. • Resource Management - As part of the Standby Arrangements, ensure the efficient and effective management and timely mobilization of required assets and capacities within the region to support affected member-states. The resources referred to herein are those beyond the resources currently managed by the AHA

Centre, i.e., ASEAN Emergency Response and Assessment Team (ERAT) and Disaster

Emergency Logistics System for ASEAN (DELSA). This management shall primarily include mobilization and deployment of identified assets and capacities under the ASEAN Joint Disaster Response Plan (AJDRP) modules, with the ASEAN-ERAT and DELSA as auxiliary support to affected states, and it includes engagement through

SASOP and financing mechanisms.26

In preparation for or in the immediate wake of a disaster, the AHA Centre can deploy an In-Country Liaison Team (ICLT) to coordinate with the affected state at the central government level. The ICLT coordination can, then, form the basis for follow-on assessment teams, particularly ASEAN-ERAT. ICLT gathers information from the affected state government and other humanitarian actors in the affected space and then provides information to the AHA Centre EOC.27 The EOC serves as the central location wherein the AHA Centre monitors disasters and coordinates ASEAN’s collective response. In addition, in the wake of a disaster, the AHA Centre can activate a WebEOC. The WebEOC provides an on-line platform to facilitate coordination and exchange of information among member-states who can, thus, monitor situations on the ground as informed by the NDMO of the affected country and AHA Centre field teams, including ASEAN-ERAT. WebEOC allows member-states to offer assistance to the affected country and for the affected country to post requests for assistance.28

AHA Centre Work Plan 2025

The period leading up to 2025 is expected to be one of transformation for the AHA Centre as it adapts to the changing humanitarian landscape in the region that is characterized by a strong desire for nationally led responses amidst the threats of potentially more devastating consequences of disasters exacerbated by unmitigated risk factors like climate change and socio-economic inequities. As guided by the AHA Centre Governing Board’s Strategic Direction for 2021-2025, the AHA Centre aims to establish itself as the enabler for ASEAN to become a global leader in disaster management, coordinating assistance through collective ASEAN response. The AHA Centre will be a center of information, learning, and excellence. The Annex of the Work Plan includes detailed activity plans for the period 2021-2025 that map tasks and outcomes for the AHA Centre to meet the AADMER Work Programme (2021-2025) priorities.29

AHA Centre Response within ASEAN

In its first nine years of work (2012-March 2021), the AHA Centre enacted emergency response mechanisms to address 36 disasters in seven countries; seven of these instances were preparedness and assessment missions. The ASEAN-ERAT deployed to 28 missions in seven ASEAN member-states by mobilizing 75 of 322 members from the ASEAN-ERAT pool.30 The most active years for ASEAN-ERAT were 2013 and 2018. In 2013, 27 ASEAN-ERAT members deployed in the wake of six disasters, while