Disaster management volunteers

Volunteers are an integral part of Joburg’s EMS. These people sacrifice their time, and sometimes their money, to help those who are destitute and helpless.

Volunteers are governed by the National Disaster Management Act, which allows municipalities to establish a unit of volunteers to participate in disaster management.

To maintain an inclusive approach to the participation of volunteers in disaster risk management, volunteers are classified into three categories:

Unit of volunteers;

General volunteers; and

Spontaneous volunteers.
 

Unit of volunteers

This category provides for individuals, groups or organisations that already have specialised skills, as well as those who undertake to be trained in specific skills.

General volunteers
This category provides a general pool of volunteers who can be drawn on by the municipality to perform a variety of functions that may or may not require specialised skills. Volunteers in this category must be registered and must meet minimum criteria set down in accordance with national standards.

Spontaneous volunteers
The Act also recognises that people will always respond spontaneously in emergencies and that these humanitarian responses should not be discouraged.

Special skills reservists corps
This category caters for all the professional reservists with specialised skills, including doctors, mechanical and civil engineers, data capturers and specialists in the fields of disaster and trauma, communications, environmental, and accounting, among others.

Training and development
Training and development is an ongoing process to ensure that the City’s volunteers are skilled to deal with different disasters. This process is in line with the national government policy of up-scaling the skills of individuals and communities.

•     Orientation course;
  
•     Basic first aid;
  
•     Basic firefighting;
  
•     Introduction to disaster management;
  
•     Introduction to fire safety;
  
•     Introduction to events management; and
  
•     Introduction to public information, education and relations.
  

Individuals are also given the opportunity to identify their areas of interest as soon as their training is completed.

Volunteer training is free of charge and is open to individuals and companies.