How We Work

Three Ways That GHI Makes Communities Safer

GHI organized a workshop to identify those types of building construction used throughout Central Asia that had collapsed in the 1988 earthquake in Armenia (as shown here).

RAISING AWARENESS

In threatened communities, GHI publishes earthquake preparedness checklists and educational leaflets that describe the possible consequences of likely earthquakes in lay terms. GHI organizes workshops and gives interviews on radio, newspaper, and TV. GHI contributes feature stories to local press and inaugurates annual earthquake days. GHI interviews survivors of large earthquakes, in order to preserve and to share their experiences.

BUILDING LOCAL INSTITUTIONS

Working with local groups, GHI produces comprehensive, consensus-driven earthquake risk management action plans. GHI provides books and journals to local technical libraries, curricula to schools, and training for journalists and earthquake risk specialists. GHI has established an online network of earthquake risk management experts in more than 70 cities around the world. In response to GHI initiatives, the mayors of Kathmandu, Nepal and Quito, Ecuador have established municipal Disaster Management Offices, while the Tibetan government in exile has undertaken seismic safety work to safeguard its Library of Tibetan Works and Archives in Dharamsala, India.

A GHI project in Quito identified highly vulnerable schools (such as the one pictured, which has inadequately strong columns on the ground floor) and developed retrofit plans.

STRENGTHENING SCHOOLS

Using local resources, a GHI project improved the earthquake safety of existing schools in Quito, Ecuador. That project resulted in a new, improved design for future school building construction throughout the country, and in earthquake safety training for parents, teachers, and children. In Kathmandu, GHI's project evaluated the seismic vulnerability of schools, organized informational seminars for school principals, produced supplements concerning earthquake safety to the school curriculum, and has resulted in more than 30 seismically strengthened ("retrofitted") schools. A GHI project in Delhi, India has focused on school building retrofits and on developing earthquake safety training manuals for teachers, students and parents. The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development created a school earthquake safety program as a result of a GHI initiative.

Jamil Mahuad

"I want to thank GHI for conducting this project with the greatest respect for the needs of Quito, and for the sensitivity with which you handled political matters related to earthquake safety plans."

Former President
Ecuador