JANUARY 2011 JICA’S WORLD 32 JICA’S WORLD JANUARY 2011

Something forEveryoneEnvironment, Firefighting, Law,

Piracy, Nursing, Agriculture

JICA cooperates with the Japan Coast Guard to provide training for officials from Asia, India, the Middle East and Africa in the latestcrime fighting techniques to prevent piracy on the high seas, reviewinternational legal systems and view the latest ships, aircraft and

other equipment employed by the Coast Guard.

CombatingPiracy

JANUARY 2011 JICA’S WORLD 54 JICA’S WORLD JANUARY 2011

It is a quiet and bucolic part of Japanwith rolling mountains and deep forests.Rocky islands are dotted around the jaggedbays and holiday hotels and seaside homescling to their sides.

As Japan rapidly rebuilt itself in the wake of WorldWar II, the region suffered an industrial and socialcatastrophe. Babies were born deformed. Locals com-plained of an array of illnesses from loss of smell toheadaches.

After a lengthy investigation it was discovered thata local chemical company had been leaching mercurywaste into the once pristine bay around MinamataCity. The prized centuries-old shellfish and fish dietof the region had turned deadly, the fish becoming a

carrier of what subse-quently became knownas Minamata disease.

More than 12,000persons were victims,1,246 of them died. Mi-namata itself may havesuffered a similar fateafter such a disaster.

Instead, the city hasreinvented itself. It became the first Japanese city toencompass environmental management into its plan-ning and today is one of 13 urban centers certified bythe government as an Eco Model City.

A Global Message And as communities across the world,particularly in developing countries, are becomingincreasingly urbanized and industrialized and facepotentially similar hazards, Minamata City has trans-

Corruption is everywhere.In so-called failed states such as Somalia it

is endemic to every aspect of daily life—bribes to remain safe, buy food, visit a clinicor even to be buried in peace and dignity. Conflicts breed breathtaking scandals and

even in developed countries there is sophisti-cated racketeering or money laundering.

Those hazards are well known anddocumented but Transparency Interna-tional, a civil society formed in 1993 toboth track and suggest remedies to cor-ruption, in regular annual reports hashighlighted corrupt practices in areassuch as water management, hospitaladministration and pharmaceuticals.The global financial crisis was fertile terri-

tory for further massive corruption and in itsrecently released 2010 annual report, Trans-parency International said corruption haseven involved itself in the battle to alleviateclimate change, an area it describes as “per-haps the most complex global governancechallenge the world has ever faced.” The bill is staggering. Price-fixing cartels

between 1990-2005 caused direct economiclosses to consumers through overchargingan estimated $300 billion, according toTransparency International’s 2009 report.

In developing countries, it said, cor-rupt politicians and government offi-cials receive between $20-40 billion inbribes annually.

Officials in highly developed countriessuch as Japan admit even there it is a con-stant, and often losing battle where thievescan often deploy both the latest technologyand some of the savviest brains to challengelaw authorities. In developing countries, the situation is

often much worse with legal and law enforce-ment departments often understaffed andlacking modern technology. A group of some 23 officials including

judges, auditors, and public prosecutors fromcountries in Africa, Latin and Central America,Asia and the Pacific as well as Japan attendeda three-month program aimed at sharing experiences, gaining knowledge in specificareas and examining concrete measureswhich they might employ in their home coun-tries through a series of lectures, discussionsessions, workshops and observation visits.

Operated by JICA in conjunction withthe U.N. Asia and Far East Institute forthe Prevention of Crime and the Treat-ment of Offenders, specific topics exam-ined including the bribery of national,foreign and international organizations, em-bezzlement, bribery in the private sector,money laundering, concealment and ob-struction of justice. Participants, mainly middle and high rank-

ing officials, said in addition to being exposedto the most sophisticated crime fightingtechnology, one of the most important as-

pects of the course was simply exchanginginformation and ideas. Brazilian state attorney Douglas Moreno

said he was surprised to learn that countriessuch as Thailand imposed the death penaltyfor some forms of corruption. He had learnedfrom experts from Hong Kong and Singaporethe necessity of close cooperation betweenall law enforcement departments, but in acountry as vast as Brazil, this must first beimplemented at the local level before beingtransferred to the national stage.

“How can we fight corruption ifeverybody is doing it?” asked Philippinestate prosecutor Marmarie Satin-Vivas. “It’sgetting harder and harder to detect corrup-tion and we have been too reactive.”She added, “We must institute a change of

attitude and work ethic. We need the politicalwill to change the system” and she said thetraining program was particularly timely be-cause her country was pursuing the adoptionof a far-reaching Freedom of Information actwhich would help combat corruption. Samarage Jaysundara, a senior state coun-

sel from Sri Lanka, said the concept of pro-tecting so-called ‘whistle-blowers’ —peoplewho inform on colleagues involved in corrup-tion—was a totally new concept in her coun-try and well worth pursuing. All participants were expected to share

their newly acquired expertise and even trainother colleagues when they return home.

WhoisWinningtheGlobalBattleAgainstCorruption?

SomethingforEveryone

Continued on page 10

If There Is a Problem,There,s a Program to Fix It

It is reputedlythe world’s

largest trainingprogram of its

kind.

Natal care and newengineering techniques

Money laundering; Liaising with Japanese law officials

JANUARY 2011 JICA’S WORLD 76 JICA’S WORLD JANUARY 2011

Men in smart blue dungarees andwhite helmets move briskly acrossthe parade ground in small squads.

Others stand at attention in smart ranks asinstructors bark a series of commands in alanguage unintelligible to a casual observer. Some absail from the roofs of buildings,

climb precariously high ladders or adminis-ter to ‘casualties’ on stretchers. The recent scene in Kitakyushu City had all

the hallmarks of a military boot camp, butthe participants were in fact firemen—in-structors from the local fire department anda group of ‘pupils’ from Myanmar, Armenia,Jamaica and the island of St. Christopher-Nevis in the Caribbean.This was the latest training course in fire-

fighting techniques, first established by JICAin 1988 and one of its oldest programs. Fire-men from nearly 80 countries have un-dergone instruction in that time. It may not fit easily into the generally ac-

cepted views of development such as infra-structure construction or education, butfirefighting is playing an increasingly centralrole in helping to maintain viable and sus-tainable communities, enhancing the con-cept of ‘human security.’ For the first time in human history, more

people now live in urban areas than in ruralcommunities and megacities are springingup across the globe—particularly in the de-veloping world. In such often crowded and chaotic social

conditions, fires are both more prevalent and

more complex to control.Recent statistics from the International

Center for Fire Statistics estimated that thereare between 7-8 million fires annually, some70,000-80,000 fire related deaths andnearly one million injuries. Efficient fire services are indispensi-

ble to a cohesive community, the mostspectacular example being the role played byfiremen in the aftermath of the 9/11 terroristattack on the World Trade Center in New Yorkwhen firemen helped rescue untold numbersof terrified office workers and paid a terribleprice in the number of deaths and injuriesthey themselves suffered. Less well known perhaps and at the other

end of the scale, the fire service departmentis the only government organization respon-sible for any disaster in Myanmar, a countrynotoriously susceptible to natural calamitiesand where in 2009 a single cyclone, Nargis,killed tens of thousands of persons andwrecked large segments of the economywithin a few short hours. Japan is another country prone to natural

disasters such as earthquakes and has devel-oped one of the world’s most sophisticatedfirefighting networks, making it an ideal‘teacher’ in firefighting techniques. The participants to the latest course

were duly impressed with the most so-phisticated equipment available, butwere equally absorbed by other as-pects of the three-month program.“In Myanmar we have very little of the lat-

est equipment,” said Myo Aung Myint, a pla-toon commander in that country’s Fire Serv-ices Department. “But here we can learn a lotof techniques which don’t need a lot ofmoney.”Following the intense training, par-

ticipants were expected to develop in-dividual action plans which they coulddevelop once they returned home. Thevarious submissions reflected both the diver-sity of the course itself and the differentneeds in individual countries. Firefighters from both St. Kitts and Nevis

and Myanmar hope to introduce new ropetechniques and indoor search and rescuetechniques to their respective organizations. Recognizing increased urbanization in Ja-

maica, fire station assistant superintendentRudolph Wayne Seaton highlighted the needfor more training to combat fires in mediumand high-rise buildings. Khachik Shmavonyan from the Armenian

Rescue Service said he would concentrate onimproving first-aid capabilities and otherparticipants stressed the needs for bettersafety control and theory of command, im-proved fire investigation procedures, safetycontrols and fire prevention systems. One area all of the participants were im-

pressed with was perhaps the most basic as-pect of the training. “The discipline andthe organization here is awesome,”said fire officer Rommel Renford Williamsfrom St. Christopher-Nevis. “We all need tolearn from that.”

There are some70,000-80,000fire related

deaths annually, and nearly one millioninjuries.

SomethingforEveryone

EightMillion Fires aYear. HELP

Firefighters learnthe ropes