Local officials to communicate earthquake risks in Makati City
Local officials and zone leaders of Brgy. Rizal in Makati City set out plans on how to win social acceptance of the Makati Risk-Sensitive Urban Redevelopment Planning Project during a Strategic Communication Planning Workshop held last October 23-24, 2008 at the City Hall of Makati.
Brgy. Rizal’s advocacy plan speaks of delivering scientific knowledge, sustained dialogue, and concerted action among different sectors of society to effectively communicate earthquake risks and to mobilize these sectors in reducing Brgy. Rizal’s physical, social, and economic vulnerability to earthquakes.
What is interesting about this advocacy plan is the local actors’ meaningful participation in its design and implementation.
The workshop participants went through a series of exercises and trainings on areas that are relevant to strategic communication and advocacy campaigns such as:
- Situational analysis;
- Basic concepts of advocacy and communication campaigns;
- Audience analysis;
- Identifying communication and advocacy goals; and
- Monitoring and evaluation of advocacy campaigns.
Know your audience
Barangay officials and zone leaders identified the key audience that they would like to target for their advocacy campaigns. They came up with a list of non-government organizations, home owners associations, business associations, church groups, people’s organizations, and schools.
The participants took into account various characteristics of target audience in designing the advocacy strategies and activities suitable for them. These include their level of knowledge about earthquake risk, level of support and resistance, and potential benefit, among others.
Person-to-person communication matters
The participants preferred interpersonal communication strategies over mainstream mass communication media. They will make use of local channels to reach target audience such as parent-teacher association (PTA) meetings for the schools, house-to-house campaign for home owners associations, and monthly general assembly for business associations.
Getting ready
The next step is to enhance the capacities of Brgy. officials and zone leaders through series of training to put them in a better position in communicating the urban redevelopment project. They identified the following areas where they would like to improve their capacities on:
- Disaster risk management concepts and principles;
- Risk communication especially in popularizing technical concepts of earthquake risks and urban redevelopment planning; and
- Community disaster preparedness
