Disaster management and resiliency in the Asia Pacific journalism fellowship

Study tour destinations: New York City, USA; Tokyo, Japan; Sendai, Japan; and Chengdu, China

The 2013 Disaster Management and Resiliency Journalism Fellowships program will introduce participating journalists to a broad range of disaster management and recovery activities in the United States, Japan and China as well as post-disaster challenges to political, economic and energy resiliency. In New York City, journalists will examine lessons learned from Hurricane Sandy, which struck the eastern seaboard on October 29, 2012 and registered as a Category 2 storm at its peak intensity. Sandy is estimated in early calculations to have caused damage of at least $20 billion, making it the second-costliest Atlantic hurricane behind only Hurricane Katrina. In Japan, the journalists will again visit the capital city for an assessment of how the Japanese government and disaster response agencies handled the Great East Japan Earthquake and the resulting tsunami and nuclear crisis as well as what lessons were learned. In Sendai, the EWC will expose the journalists to the personal side of natural disasters through discussions with students, aid workers and community members. Finally, the journalists will visit Chengdu to examine China’s recovery efforts following the 2008 Wenchuan Earthquake. In all three countries, the role and responsibility of the media to accurately report on disasters will be explored.

This 14-day professional dialogue, study and travel program is designed for working print, broadcast and online journalists from the United States, Japan, China and those Asian and Oceanic countries bordering the tectonic Pacific Plate. It will introduce participating journalists to a broad range of disaster management activities in the United States, Japan and China as well as post-disaster challenges to political, economic and energy resiliency. Emphasis will be placed on:

• Disaster mitigation, preparedness, response and recovery efforts at the local, federal and international levels;
• Government, military, business and civil-society initiatives successful in reducing risk and in providing assistance post-disaster;
• Resilience as the capacity to recover from disasters and the maintenance of political structures, economic markets, energy policies and the functionality of society in the wake of a catastrophe;
• The impact of recent catastrophic natural disasters on economic markets and supply chains throughout the Asia Pacific region;
• Responses to the Fukushima nuclear crisis and the future of energy policy and security in the Asia Pacific region.