[Skywarn] Finnish ECOM Conference Report

[Lloyd Colston]

 From the American Radio Relay League:

>==>AMATEUR RADIO EMERGENCY COMMUNICATION FOCUS OF WORLD CONFERENCE
>
>Tampere, Finland, played host June 13-14 to the first Global Amateur Radio
>Emergency Communications Conference (GAREC 2005). Participants from 17
>countries and representatives of all three International Amateur Radio Union
>(IARU) regions gathered to discuss and exchange information on the role of
>Amateur Radio in emergency communication. A conference statement summarized
>the value of Amateur Radio to emergency communication worldwide.
>
>"The Amateur Radio Service has the proven capabilities and capacities to
>serve the international community through its global network of
>infrastructure-independent stations," the statement concluded. "Such
>stations are not only most likely to withstand the physical impact of
>disasters, but their flexibility furthermore avoids the overload all public
>networks inevitably experience in the aftermath of disasters."
>
>The statement also pointed to the Amateur Service as "an invaluable resource
>of skilled operators, trained and experienced in maintaining communications
>under the most adverse conditions." It further concluded that it's essential
>"to ensure that this resource can be fully utilized in the service of
>emergency and disaster response providers." Conferees agreed as well that
>the Amateur Service needs access to "appropriate portions of the shared and
>limited resource of the radio frequency spectrum."
>
>The IARU has submitted the summary as an input document to the World Summit
>on the Information Society (WSIS), set to take place in Tunisia this
>November.
>
>Representing the IARU and chairing GAREC 2005 was Hans Zimmermann, HB9AQS,
>the IARU's International Coordinator for Emergency Communications. Past ARRL
>President Rod Stafford, W6ROD, represented IARU in his capacity as Region 2
>President and the League in his capacity as International Affairs Vice
>President.
>
>Major topics included cooperation between radio amateurs and institutional
>emergency response providers on the national level, and an exchange of
>experiences from recent events. Presentations showed how hams support
>emergency responders as skilled volunteer telecommunication operators as
>well as via their own global networks.
>
>Conferees also talked over ways to improve and facilitate the work of
>emergency communication networks. Participants agreed on the desirability of
>establishing a "Center of Activity Frequency" for emergency traffic on 80,
>40, 20, 17 and 15 meters. SRAL, the IARU member-society for Finland and the
>host of GAREC 2005 will forward a proposal to that effect to the IARU for
>its consideration. This could happen during the IARU Region 1 Conference
>this September. GAREC-2005 did not put forth specific center-of-activity
>frequencies, but the proposal did recommend calling them "The Tampere
>Frequencies."
>
>Because of Tampere's association with the history of emergency and disaster
>communication, the city's name has become nearly synonymous with emergency
>telecommunication. Among signal events, an experts' conference there in 1991
>adopted the Tampere Declaration on Disaster Communications. In 1998, the
>Intergovernmental Conference on Emergency Telecommunications (ICET-98)
>adopted the Tampere Convention on the Provision of Telecommunication
>Resources for Disaster Mitigation and Relief Operations. Effective as of
>January 8, 2005, the convention largely eliminates roadblocks to moving
>telecommunications personnel and equipment across international borders into
>and within disaster-stricken areas. Tampere has hosted several related
>conferences on emergency telecommunication as well. To maintain the
>momentum, plans already are being discussed for a second global conference
>in 2006.
>
>A GAREC 2005 summary is available on the IARU Web site
><http://www.iaru.org/emergency/summary.html>.--IARU
>

-- 


Lloyd Colston             Mayes County Emergency Management
Pryor, OK USA           http://www.mayescem.us

"The President can make you a general, but only communications 
can make you a commander."  General Curtis LeMay