BANYUMAS, CENTRAL JAVA — The 2023 Volunteer Camp initiated by the Disaster Management Center (DMC) of Dompet Dhuafa was successfully held from Wednesday to Friday (22—24/11/2023) at Wana Wisata Baturraden, Kemutug Lor, Baturaden, Banyumas Regency. The event featured various training sessions aimed at DMC volunteers from all over Indonesia.
Participants of this year’s Volunteer Camp were DMC volunteers hailing from Banda Aceh, North Sumatra, West Sumatra, South Sumatra, Riau, South Sulawesi, Southeast Sulawesi, North Sulawesi, Central Sulawesi, NTT (East Nusa Tenggara), NTB (West Nusa Tenggara), Bengkulu, Maluku, Bangka Belitung, East Kalimantan, and Central Kalimantan. The total number of participants in the 2023 Volunteer Camp reached 250 volunteers.
The 2023 Volunteer Camp adopted a mobile classroom method, allowing participants to choose which classes they wanted to attend, according to the schedule set throughout the event.
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“The takeaway from this national-scale 2023 Volunteer Camp is the socialization of disaster prevention or mitigation. This is an essential part of the disaster management process,” explained Shofa Qudus, GM of DMC Dompet Dhuafa’s Program, in his opening remarks.
The event featured collaborations with various Dompet Dhuafa disaster response units, including the Community Service Institution (LPM), Emergency Education Response of the Human Development Institute (RDP LPI), Emergency Health Response of the Free Healthcare Service (RDK LKC), Disaster Response Preacher Corps of Dompet Dhuafa (DTB Cordofa), and Dompet Dhuafa Volunteer (DDV).
The 2023 Volunteer Camp also involved disaster management partners from the National Disaster Management Agency (BNPB) and the National Search and Rescue Agency (BASARNAS).
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Moreover, training at the Volunteer Camp was conducted through practical methods or simulations, involving participants in every process, as well as group discussions and sharing project management experiences to build a collective understanding in implementing various activities in disaster management.
Volunteers could participate in the event through one of two tracks. The first was the Challenge track and the second was the Non-Challenge or general track. In the Challenge track, participants were required to conduct social activities in their respective areas. Once they completed the social activities, the Volunteer Camp covered their transportation.
“From Maluku itself, there are five of us, and we could participate in today’s camp because we successfully completed a challenge, which was recycling waste at our school,” said Hamdan, a participant from Maluku.
In the Non-Challenge track, participants were not required to perform social activities, and their transportation was not covered by the organizers.
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The main goal of this event was to enhance the volunteers’ capabilities in project management. It focused on how participants could build more resilient communities in facing disasters, guided by the standards and procedures established in DMC Dompet Dhuafa’s Business Process.
This event also aimed to improve communication and consolidation among volunteers in their respective regions, serving as a platform for sharing experiences that could trigger an increase in the quality and abilities of volunteers.
The expected outcome of the 2023 Volunteer Camp was for the involved volunteers to create projects or business processes that could be implemented in their respective regions, impacting the widespread benefit of a volunteer.
Disaster management is a series of activities that include mitigation, rescue, and rehabilitation, which must be organized coordinatively, simultaneously, quickly, and accurately. Therefore, in disaster handling, volunteers need to be equipped with the ability and skills to identify and manage a project from planning, execution, to reporting in disaster management. (Dompet Dhuafa/DMC/FZN/AFP)