In celebration of its 25th anniversary, the Asia-Pacific community of the World Association of Community Radio Broadcasters (AMARC) is set to hold a series of workshops from 17 to 20 October 2008 in Yogyakarta, Indonesia, in making community radios responsive to poverty and situations of disaster.

The workshops aim to make community radios more responsive to conditions of poverty and situations of disaster. Given the crucial role of community radios in such contexts and the need to have more trained and sensitive individuals working on these community radios, the workshops are adopting the train the trainors approach. With a multiplier effect in mind, participants in these workshops are expected to echo their learnings to their organisations and communities.

Among the themes that the workshops on poverty alleviation will cover are: community's collective identification of development priorities; meaningful participation of women and marginalised communities; effective implementation of policies in radio programmes; and creation of effective linkages beyond the communities.

Meanwhile, the workshops on disaster management include modules on safeguarding radio stations; immediate re-establishment of radio stations; the role of community in reconstruction and rehabilitation; and gender sensitising of radio stations.

As Suman Basnet, coordinator of AMARC-Asia-Pacific said, [The workshops] aim to strengthen the capacity of community radios to deal with issues of poverty alleviation and disaster management in the communities they serve.”

The “Capacity Building Workshop for Community Radios for Fighting Poverty and Natural Disaster” is being organised in collaboration with the Jaringan Radio Komunitas Indonesia (JRKI), Combine Resources Institution (COMBINE, Indonesia), and the AMARC-Japan Working Group.