Ministry of Transport, Public Works and Watermanagement

At the beginning of 2007 the then deputy Director-General of the Romanian National Company Motorways and National Roads (RNCMNR), Christian Duica, applied ‘disaster management’ as a subject for cooperation in Partners for Roads. The problem was defined as: “due to heavy rainfall in a hilly country, Romania faces problems during heavy rainfall, especially in the higher parts of the country. These problems are ground and road shifts, at the same time lower parts of Romania face problems with floods. 

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The past year was a turning point in many respects. Continuing professionalisation in both organisational and
operational areas gave a proactive focus to the activities of the Departmental Coordination Centre for Crisis
Management (DCC-VenW). In many cases, the DCC-VenW took frequent operational action, taking care to inform top political and administrative high ranked civil servants quickly and thoroughly.

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Futurologist Patrick van der Duin of the Delft University of Technology is worried. The Netherlands appears to be collectively looking in the rear-view mirror. Historians are becoming celebrities and what is considered history is suddenly returning to the front pages. Patrick van der Duin, though, believes we should be looking forwards. Not that we should be consulting gurus, futurologists or trend watchers – instead we should keep exploring for ourselves. The Departmental Crisis Management Coordination Centre (DCC) of the Dutch Ministry of Transport, Public Works and Water Management is doing exactly that, except that their explorations are not limited to their own field – instead they are casting their attention much further afield.

The DCC does not just spring into action whenever a crisis happens to occur. It also develops policies designed primarily to prevent crises that would affect vital Dutch infrastructure from arising. “Our motto is ‘Failing to prepare is preparing for failure’,” states Gerard Laanen, Head of the DCC, “So we are always making preparations for crises, with scenarios for dealing with them and for evaluating them after they have passed. We have carefully outlined ideas about crisis management, but we also have the need to test our ideas so that we can exchange knowledge and insights with other relevant parties and specialists. To that end we organise motivational workshops, at which we bring together managers and crisis managers from the world of business, for example Europe Container Terminals and Schiphol Airport, futurologists and other academic specialists. But we invite colleagues from other government departments for inspiration as well. These meetings of experts are particularly useful in terms of both knowledge exchange and developing networks.”

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The Government of the Philippines has requested IMO to mobilize a salvage expert to provide guidance on assessing the technical aspects of the salvage proposals and plans being considered in the case of the Princess of the Stars.

This follows an earlier offer of any assistance and co-operation the Government might require by IMO Secretary-General Efthimios E. Mitropoulos, immediately following last month's tragic accident. The Princess of the Stars, a ferry carrying 861 passengers and crew, went aground and sank on 21 June 2008 in the Philippines. Almost all those on board lost their lives.

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The importance of crisis management is becoming increasingly apparent. According to a number of studies and
scenarios that have been carried out at both national and international levels, a changing world is emerging that requires greater anticipation.

For years now DCC-VenW has built up valuable experience in preparing the VenW organization for a range of crises. Educating, training and exercising are seen from both within and outside of the Ministry of Transport, Public Works and Water Management as one of the core qualities of DCC-VenW. As far as technology and facilities are concerned, DCC-VenW has an up-to-date location at its disposal that is available 24/7. This is an important factor when having to react to a crisis.

During 2008, interdepartmental activities took place frequently with the Task Force management of Flooding exercises taking absolute priority. Emanating the National Security Strategy presented by the cabinet in 2007, a national risk assessment was carried out in June 2008 in which the following threats to the Netherlands were assessed as being the most urgent:

• Pandemic

• Energy supply security

• Polarisation and radicalisation

• Water security

Issues requiring coherent interdepartmental strategy was also necessary in the run-up to the “Waterproef” disaster exercise. Preparations for the EDO (Worst Credible Floods) in the Netherlands were tested in this exercise. The biggest ever national exercise also taught us that interdepartmental cooperation would benefit from being intensified in areas including the provision of information and recommendations and also regarding educational and training exercises.

Streamlined concerted action with all the relevant network partners, good communication facilities and lots of exercises give crisis management in the Netherlands an excellent starting point for warding off any new threats that might arise. In this respect 2008 turned out to be the start of a new approach towards crisis management. In 2009 the emphasis will be on further interdepartmental cooperation at DCC-VenW, as well as realising the lessons that were learned from the Task Force Management of Flooding (TMO) and also signing up market parties for the new Education, Training & Exercise policy plan. 

DCC-VenW is also preparing for the unthinkable in 2009.