ISLAMABAD: The National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA) on Friday launched the first ever National Roster on Surge Emergency Response Team (SERT) with cooperation of National Humanitarian Network (NHN) Pakistan and Actionaid Pakistan. NDMA former chairman Lieutenant General (r) Nadeem Ahmed was the chief guest at the launching ceremony of the Roster. While addressing the opening session of the ceremony, NDMA Operation Member Brigadier Mukhtar Ahmed said that the launching of first ever National Roster on SERT was an important breakthrough towards realisation of our cherished national goal to build a disaster resilient Pakistan. He said that this National Roster was a comprehensive resource pool which comprises of the technical experts and people from diverse fields who have decade long experience in mitigating emergencies and disasters. He hoped that roster members would be playing a vibrant and active participatory role to cope with disasters and emergencies in future. SERT National Roster is a nationwide team of experts and practitioners in the field of disaster management and sustainable development. Transforming Surge Competencies initiative is taken with the objective to increase capacity of skilled personnel for civil society at international, national and regional levels, sharing of good practice on surge management practices, collaborate national, regional and international pilots and shared rosters to improve organisational surge capacity and to establish strong evidence to show how collaborative surge approaches work. The expected outcome of the project is more effective at national and international levels. Nadeem Ahmed while speaking at the occasion as chief guest said that it was his long time desire to establish a pool of experts to respond to emergency situations. He lauded the efforts of NDMA and its partners for launching the first ever National Roster on SERT. He urged them to share their knowledge so that future generations could be saved from devastations. He specifically emphasised on preventive approach towards disaster mitigation to minimise the impact of future disasters. The participants ensured their full support and participation in upcoming events and emergencies if any. Published in Daily Times, February 24th 2018.