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The workshop organized in Lima in collaboration with the National Center for Disaster Risk Assessment, Prevention and Reduction of Peru (CENEPRED) on May 13-15 2015 represented a great step ahead for GEM both in having our regional partners communicating the progress of their activities and in enhancing their ability to perform calculations with the OpenQuake-Engine. The new GUI (graphical user interface) of the Engine was extremely well received and participants were able to perform risk calculations in about half the usual time. Here below a collapse map for an historical event in Antioquia, the second largest region in Colombia.

There are several other projects starting soon in Colombia in which GEM guidelines and tools will be used and similar results were also obtained for Chile and for a few buildings in Venezuela.GEM also implemented a training workshop for CENEPRED staff on the use and applications of the GEM-developed Inventory Data Capture Tools (IDCT), with the aim of enhancing CENEPRED ability to carry out building inventories. Besides the theoretical training, the exercise included actual inventory of building in several areas of Lima. As a result of this effort, CENEPRED is now coordinating the preparation of the exposure model for Lima, which will be utilized to estimate buildings damage and loss for the Peruvian capital.

The interest of CENEPRED in establishing a long-term collaboration with GEM was demonstrated by the creation of a working group to carry out a risk assessment for the city of Lima and by their willingness to share existing disaster risk information about Peru with our scientists.It is also worth mentioning that an agreement was advanced with UNESCO-Peru to join forces and coordinate activities within the risk assessment of Lima. With UNESCO-Peru’s assistance, the risk assessment of schools and historical monuments will be incorporated in the risk assessment of Lima adding, in this way, value to the entire project.