As part of HDCS’s Disaster Risk Reduction and Management efforts, HDCS, together with personnel from the Red Cross Society, organized a one-day Emergency Tent Building practicum on 21st April 2023 at HDCS HQ.
This was a disaster preparedness initiative supported by our partners Humedica and BMS World Mission. This practicum helped build skills and capacity, enabling the participants to effectively contribute when responding to disasters.
15 staff across HDCS projects participated in this training given by two trainers from the Nepal Red Cross Society. They learned how to build an emergency tent of out minimal and locally available resources. Two types of model emergency shelters were built, one for lowlands and the other for high altitude; the tunnel and two-roof model. The materials used to make the tents were bamboo, ropes, nails, plastic bottle waste, tarpaulins, and opaque plastic sacs.
Having a shelter in times of disaster is a crucial necessity to survival and safety for the vulnerable disaster-affected people. Hence with these transferrable skills learned, our staff will be able to respond and support communities better if a disaster strikes.
Additionally, the trainers also introduced the term “BRACING” that caught the attention of all HDCS staff. This term refers to strengthening of the bamboo structure. HDCS staff learned different ways of tying knots and ropes to hold the bamboo structure and ways to mount and cut the tarpaulins to fit the frame and model and also to make the partition wall, windows and doors for ventilation.
All of the HDCS staff who participated concurred that the training was valuable and beneficial to their relevant area of work. Furthermore, the HDCS’s technical team will plan to develop its own bamboo structure design to cut down the time spent on building a tent or shelter for efficient and effective responses in real life in local communities.