| NSF Org: |
CMMI Division of Civil, Mechanical, and Manufacturing Innovation |
| Recipient: |
|
| Initial Amendment Date: | July 24, 2015 |
| Latest Amendment Date: | July 24, 2015 |
| Award Number: | 1550349 |
| Award Instrument: | Standard Grant |
| Program Manager: |
Robin L. Dillon-Merrill
CMMI Division of Civil, Mechanical, and Manufacturing Innovation ENG Directorate for Engineering |
| Start Date: | August 1, 2015 |
| End Date: | June 30, 2017 (Estimated) |
| Total Intended Award Amount: | $49,495.00 |
| Total Awarded Amount to Date: | $49,495.00 |
| Funds Obligated to Date: |
|
| History of Investigator: |
|
| Recipient Sponsored Research Office: |
110 8TH ST TROY NY US 12180-3590 (518)276-6000 |
| Sponsor Congressional District: |
|
| Primary Place of Performance: |
110 Eight Street Troy NY US 12180-3522 |
| Primary Place of
Performance Congressional District: |
|
| Unique Entity Identifier (UEI): |
|
| Parent UEI: |
|
| NSF Program(s): | HDBE-Humans, Disasters, and th |
| Primary Program Source: |
|
| Program Reference Code(s): |
|
| Program Element Code(s): |
|
| Award Agency Code: | 4900 |
| Fund Agency Code: | 4900 |
| Assistance Listing Number(s): | 47.041 |
ABSTRACT
Disasters can generate devastating human, social, and economic losses. The extreme and frequently sudden nature of these events poses significant challenges for the organizations involved in the delivery of critical relief supplies. Ensuring an efficient and timely flow of critical supplies to a disaster is, without any doubt, a challenging endeavor with huge economic and social impacts. Improving the state of the art and practice of post-disaster humanitarian logistics (PD-HL) is extremely important. As part of the fieldwork funded by this Rapid Response Research (RAPID) grant, the team will study how the local social networks - an integral part of the local community - interact with the technical tasks that are part of the relief effort. This is important because research has highlighted that the nature of the interactions between the social and the technical aspects in PD-HL operations influence disaster response effectiveness. These "socio-technical interactions" reflect the way in which the technical tasks are structured, and the way in which the social networks are integrated (or not) and perform the technical tasks. In post-disaster environments - where the entire social system is under stress, the social aspects of PD-HL acquire tremendous importance - playing a huge role in determining the effectiveness of the effort. Learning from actual disaster responses is an important to help minimize the negative impacts of disasters on our citizens and the economy.
The team will study the mechanisms through which social networks identify, gather, deliver, and distribute relief supplies. Specifically, the team will collect perishable data on organizational involvement, activity, roles, collaboration, and location. These data will be used to test assumptions derived from pre-vious events taking advantage of the insight gained on how the socio-technical interactions influence the response. Data collection will include short and informal and in-depth interviews with the individuals involved in the PD-HL efforts, at all levels of action (e.g., international, national, regional, local, and community levels), from all groups (e.g., established, emergent, extending), and at all levels of power (e.g., decision-makers, operational personnel). Furthermore, information will be gathered on critical and non-critical supply flow estimates, challenges to the relief effort, solutions developed to contend with challenges, and estimates of unmet demands of critical supplies. The work is very important because an enhanced understanding of the socio-technical interactions will facilitate the implementation of procedures that foster disaster response effectiveness and limit the negative impacts of problematic practices and behaviors. Doing so would reduce the overall impacts of disasters in the United States and abroad.
PROJECT OUTCOMES REPORT
Disclaimer
This Project Outcomes Report for the General Public is displayed verbatim as submitted by the Principal Investigator (PI) for this award. Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this Report are those of the PI and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation; NSF has not approved or endorsed its content.
The fieldwork developed after the 2015 Gorkha Earthquakes in Nepal have provided an understanding of the magnitude of the disaster and the efforts put in place by the government and the different relief organizations, such as INGOs, Volunteers and Community Groups. Previous to these disasters, Nepalese officials already had a Preparedness and Response plan which provided a guide to support the efforts provided for the population in need. Their main operation structure was centralized in the Department of Home Affairs, through the National Emergency Operations Center. With the protocols activated, the government officials together with the established relief organizations were able to assist the population in need. Nevertheless, fieldwork findings confirmed that this preparation and level of coordination was not enough to handle a response as large as this one, where more than 8 million people in 39 districts were affected and over 1.4 million were in need of food, water, and shelter. Community Groups and Volunteers (non-established organizations) played a major role in assisting effectively the local community in support to this official response. The research conducted showed that these groups were activated by prosocial values and desire to help. The fact that they had flexible operations and the improvisational nature of their decision making processes allowed them to adapt to rapidly changing environment. Moreover, the research shed light into the role played by social media in amplifying the message of socio-technical networks involved in the response, which allowed them to reach out beyond their immediate social networks and have access to a wealth of resources, including cash and in-kind donations, as well as volunteers.
Last Modified: 11/10/2017
Modified by: Jose Holguin-Veras
Please report errors in award information by writing to: awardsearch@nsf.gov.
