Bhutan - Institutional Strengthening Mission

This Institutional Strengthening Mission was a follow-up activity of the UN-SPIDER Technical Advisory Mission to Bhutam in November 2014 and included a training course. Participants included representatives of relevant agencies in Bhutan including the Department of Disaster Management, the National Land Commission, the Forest Fire Division or the Department of Hydro-Meteorological Services.

The goal of the training was to strengthen Bhutan's capacities to use satellite imagery for disaster management. The course should enhance the capacity of Bhutanese officials on disaster preparedness, response and recovery at national and local levels and mitigating the impacts on people’s life and livelihoods when they are hit by disasters, thereby contributing to long-term disaster risk reduction in the country. The training programme included topics such as setting up a national spatial data infrastructure, forest fire and landslide assessment as well as the use of Space-based information for emergency response and post-disaster impact assessment.