Corrigendum to “Competency of the Infantry Troops of the Nepalese Army in Disaster Response” [Journal of Risk Analysis and Crisis Response 9(2), (2019), 62–73]
- DOI
- 10.2991/jracr.k.200522.001How to use a DOI?
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- © 2020 The Authors. Published by Atlantis Press SARL.
- Open Access
- This is an open access article distributed under the CC BY-NC 4.0 license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/).
In the original article, there were mistakes in introduction section paragraph 11, paragraph 13, paragraph 14 and paragraph 15. These paragraphs contain wrong abbreviation ‘SKK’. The abbreviation should be ‘SSK’. The wrong abbreviation was also written in paragraph 1 of method section, table 1 and paragraph 2 of effect of rank and training in competition section, and paragraph 1 and 3 of discussion section. Similarly paragraph 11 and paragraph 15 of introduction section, and paragraph 1 of method of analysis section also contain wrong word ‘Nepali’. They should be replaced by word ‘Nepalese’. The corrected paragraphs and table are given below.
1. INTRODUCTION
But in contrary to this urgency, disaster response preparedness of those regular infantry troops has remained in shadow. It is because the organization is moreover focused on strengthening its war-waging capability. The secondary mandate like disaster management has been facing chronic resource shortage (Poudel, 2016). In such a scenario full-fledged preparedness of such troops in disaster response is hardly attainable. And this reality was clearly evident during the response operations of Gorkha earthquake 2015. Various national and international after-action reports of Gorkha Earthquake have emphasized that there is a need to ‘enhance search and rescue capability of Nepalese Army’ (MoHA, 2015; MoHA, 2016). They have also stated that the troops were less trained and less equipped for disaster response (Manandhar et al., 2017; Grunewald & Burlet, 2016).
Furthermore, disaster response knowledge consists of two categories i.e. ‘Soft skill knowledge (SSK)’ and ‘Technical Skill Knowledge (TSK)’ (Barelli et al., 2014). The SSK is non-technical, interpersonal and cognitive like principles, leadership, teamwork, and communication42 whereas the TSK is procedural and systematic to function technical work like search and rescue, debris management, dead body management, casualty evacuation etc (Poul, 2018). And both the knowledge is prerequisite for the normal infantry troops since they have to carry out multiple functions during a disaster scenario. The Gorkha Earthquake is an example how these same troops carried out series of response operations like search and rescue, casualty evacuation, debris management, dead body management simultaneously (Barsky et al., 2007).
When it comes to competency building, the National Strategy for Disaster Risk Management 2009, the National Framework for Disaster Management 2013 and the Disaster Risk Reduction and Mitigation Act 2017 have also guided the Nepalese Army to carry out preparedness activities of its troops. Similarly, the Nepalese Army Disaster Management Doctrine has also defined that training, exercise, and rehearsal are the regular tasks for the competency building.
In this backdrop, it is important that the knowledge and preparedness of normal infantry troops should be studied. But hardly this issue has garnered interest in the academic research field. Julia Hornyacsek (2018) admits that the ‘disaster response competency of such regular infantry forces has hardly been studied’. In this regard, this research aims to study the disaster response competency of regular infantry troops of the Nepalese Army setting following research questions
- (1)
Whether the SSK and TSK of the regular infantry troops of the Nepalese Army adequate enough to carry out effective response operations?
- (3)
Is there any gap in the SSK and TSK, and preparedness of the regular infantry troops of the Nepalese Army?
2.4. Method of analysis
Fundamentally, the descriptive analysis method and inferential analysis method were adopted during research that helped to examine the relationship between the Nepalese Army’s disaster response competency building initiative and its effect on personnel competency. For the purpose, three key independent variables i.e. SSK, TSK, and disaster preparedness adaptation were considered as study factors. These variables were again analyzed on the basis of two dependent variables i.e. ‘rank’ (Officer, JCO and other ranks) and ‘training’ (Trained and Untrained troops). Whether these variables make any significant difference in the study participants’ knowledge and preparedness or not was the aim of the analysis process. Similarly during the second survey prevailing perception of senior army officers on the engagement of the Nepalese Army in disaster response was analyzed.
3.4. Effect of rank and training in the competency
| Competency | SSK | TSK | Preparedness activities | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| SSK | Pearson Correlation | 1 | 0.205* | –0.051 |
| Sig. (2-tailed) | 0.041 | 0.566 | ||
| TSK | Pearson Correlation | 0.205* | 1 | –0.193* |
| Sig. (2-tailed) | 0.041 | 0.041 | ||
| Preparedness activities | Pearson Correlation | –0.051 | –0.193* | 1 |
| Sig. (2-tailed) | 0.566 | 0.041 | ||
Correlation is significant at the 0.05 level (2-tailed).
Correlation matrix of competency
To study whether the participants’ training in disaster response makes any significant difference in their competency Linear Regression test was conducted. As per the equation derived (F(3, 82) = 11.384, p < 0.000) the disaster response training of participants is statistically significant to their response competency as a whole (see Tables 2). But when compared individually, Coefficients test result illustrated that only the training has statistically significant relation with preparedness activities where the p-value is less than 0.05 (p < 0.000) and t value is 5.539 (see Table 3). That means the trained troops were more prepared than untrained troops, whereas with SSK and TSK training factor do not have any significant relation since P values are higher than 0.05.
4. DISCUSSION
This research has ultimately helped to understand the competency of the general infantry troops of the Nepalese Army in disaster response operations. Indeed, in the army, junior officers and JCOs are the key personalities. They are the one to lead disaster response operations in the field. But the result showed that the junior officers and JCOs have limited SSK. The issues of Civil-Military Relation, a priority of their engagement during a disaster, and the responsibilities of local government in disaster management are much important at their respective level. It is because at the local level they are the one to play interface between civilian authorities, civil societies and responding troops. They have to establish effective communication, coordination, and cooperation with those civilian bodies and civil communities at the time of preparedness and response. In the void of such knowledge, they can’t drive the venture in an effective way.
In the aspect of training, more than 50% of the participants were found participated in some kind of disaster-related training and exercise in their career. It is true that following the essence of national policies and guidelines (MoHA, 2017; Nepalese Army, 2017) the organization has credibly invested to train its infantry troops in disaster response training like Collapsed Structure Search and Rescue Training, Medical First Responders Training, Dead Body Management Training, Deep Water Rescue Training, and Sphere Training (Nepalese Army, 2017). But the result of SSK and TSK doesn’t warrant qualitative conduct of such training. The understandings of trained participants are low in many fundamental issues. And there is not much difference amongst trained troops’ and untrained troops’ responses. Surprising only 22% of the trained participants replied that Search and Rescue is the most suitable tasks for them for disaster response. This sort of gap clearly indicates the need for better orientation of the infantry troops in disaster response venture. Further research is suggested to investigatein-depth issues of this aspect.
Footnotes
DOI of original article: https://doi.org/10.2991/jracr.k.190703.002
Cite this article
TY - JOUR AU - Shrijan Bahadur Malla AU - Shuichi Hasegawa AU - Ranjan Kumar Dahal PY - 2020 DA - 2020/05/26 TI - Corrigendum to “Competency of the Infantry Troops of the Nepalese Army in Disaster Response” [Journal of Risk Analysis and Crisis Response 9(2), (2019), 62–73] JO - Journal of Risk Analysis and Crisis Response SP - 119 EP - 120 VL - 10 IS - 3 SN - 2210-8505 UR - https://doi.org/10.2991/jracr.k.200522.001 DO - 10.2991/jracr.k.200522.001 ID - Malla2020 ER -