Abstract
There is a clear need for integrated research on landslide disaster risk. Landslide disasters have major impacts in developing countries due to the increasing social vulnerability of both rural and urban communities. In recent decades, landslide disasters in Latin America triggered by both precipitation and earthquakes have also increased considerably. Thus, scientific contributions based on integrated risk research are quite urgent for improving the knowledge base for reducing the vulnerability of exposed communities to landslides. Thus, there is a parallel necessity to promote capacity building for young scientists in Latin America by considering the shift of disaster paradigm to recognize the “unnaturalness” of disasters. Under such a framework, there are particular goals to be pursued including: (1) Development of landslide regional networks with a commitment for understanding risk as a socially constructed process; (2) Engagement of young scientists in integrated landslide risk research; (3) Inducing a scientific multi- and transdisciplinary approach for integrated landslide risk research; (4) Development and implementation of capacity building; (5) Contributing to the dissemination and application of common methodologies on landslide disasters investigations; and (6) Strengthening collaboration on integrated landslide disaster risk research in Latin America. In this paper, we present one of the main activities of the ICL Latin-American network in terms of capacity building carried out in 2013; to that end, the first international workshop on forensic investigations of disasters associated with landslides was held in the University of Sciences and Arts of Chiapas in the city of Tuxtla Gutierrez, Chiapas, Mexico, from June 26th to July 4th, 2013.
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Acknowledgments
The organizers and participants of the workshop highly appreciated the facilities, attention, and support provided by the Universidad de Ciencias y Artes de Chiapas (UNICACH). Special thanks are due to Roberto Domínguez-Castellanos, Rector of UNICACH, and Silvia Ramos, Director of the Centro de Gestión de Riesgos y Cambio Climático-UNICACH. Thanks are also due to Roberto Barrios and Leobardo Domínguez-Morales who kindly shared their knowledge as professors of the workshop. We are grateful to ICSU for providing a grant to carry out the project “Landslide networking for disaster studies, capacity building, partnership and engagement in Latin America and the Caribbean.”
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Alcántara-Ayala, I., Oliver-Smith, A. ICL Latin-American Network: on the road to landslide reduction capacity building. Landslides 11, 315–318 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10346-013-0464-7
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10346-013-0464-7