A roundtable discussion entitled “How to Better Coordinate Humanitarian Response” will take place on October 27, 2011 from 2:00-5:00 p.m. at the Georgia Tech Marcus Nanotechnology Building during the 2011 “France-Atlanta: Together Towards Innovation” conference. The roundtable will consist of two panels: one dedicated to the lessons learned from the humanitarian response in Haïti following the 2010 earthquake; the other on NGO governance.  Pinar Keskinocak, co-director of the Georgia Tech Center for Health and Humanitarian Logistics, will be moderating the panel on “Governing Humanitarian Response.”

International cooperation in humanitarian efforts is one of the multiple themes to be addressed during this year’s France-Atlanta conference. In recent years, humanitarian emergencies, particularly those following natural disasters, have raised a major issue: how to achieve coordination and synergistic collaboration among different NGOs and government organizations, so as to avoid overlapping efforts, waste of resources, and inefficiencies. During this roundtable discussion, representatives from French and American NGOs and government agencies such as Handicap International, CARE, Medshare, and USAID will reflect on the tools that could be developed in order to improve management of humanitarian crises.

This is the second year Georgia Tech will be partnering with the Consulate General of France in Atlanta to present the France-Atlanta conference. “France-Atlanta: Together Towards Innovation” will be held October 26- November 12, and will include a series of fifteen French-American events centered on innovation, including scientific symposiums, business workshops, cultural events, and humanitarian focus events. 

Click here to register for the roundtable discussion. For more information about the 2011 France-Atlanta conference, visit www.france-atlanta.org.