Bulletin 13 English - 21 February 2006

Content

UNJLC
DRC Logistics Bulletin # 13
21 February 2006

1.    LOGISTICS COORDINATION
2.    AVIATION
3.    GEOGRAPHIC INFORMATION SYSTEMS

1.    LOGISTICS COORDINATION

North Katanga / Mitwaba humanitarian crisis

• UNJLC Logistics unit has been requested to support  UN Agencies, MONUC and NGO's so as to enhance Logistics coordination  The purpose is to enable humanitarian assistance to reach Mitwaba area(25 000 to 35 000 IDP are reported in Mitwaba area).
• UNJLC put this issue on the agenda of the Transport Sub-Group meeting held on 6 February. MONUC accepted to move 30 Tons of WFP food to Mitwaba using an MI 8 Helicopter. The last rotation of this MI 8 was done on Saturday February the 18th. This food was pre-positioned in Lubumbashi WFP Warehouse. The remaining food to be delivered will be transported to Mitwaba area by road. WFP has already contracted private carriers for that purpose.
• UNJLC invites all humanitarian organisations to provide figures about their needs of transportation to Mitwaba area (a questionnaire has been circulated). Then a consolidation of cargo will be done, and it will then be easier to find means of transportation.
• The main issues are the conditions of roads (especially during raining season) and security situation in the whole region of North Katanga.
  The other bottleneck identified is that only small aircrafts can land on the Mitwaba airstrip, thus limiting air cargo transport options. Moreover as there is no refuelling possibility in Mitwaba the aircrafts must fill their tank for the return flight.
• During the meeting on Katanga emergency held at OCHA villa on 20 February, UNJLC GIS unit cell was tasked to provide support. UNJLC GIS unit will provide mapping assistance based on data on the state of roads gathered by OCHA.

Logistics Working Group Meetings

• The Logistics Working Group meeting took place on Wednesday 8 February. The aim of the meeting was to let each Sub-Group lead agency present its progress report: all the Sub-Groups have finalized their Terms of References and are in the process to finalize a schedule for each task.
• The Logistics Working Group is made up of five Sub Working Groups (Transport, Procurement, Customs and Clearing, Fuel and Data Collection) in which Logistics Officers from UN agencies, MONUC and NGOs meet to address Logistics issues together. Each Sub Group is led by one or two agencies, and report to the Logistics Working Group, which meets on a bi-monthly basis.
• The data collection Sub-Group will start its activities once the other Sub-Groups will have defined their needs in term of data collection.
• The next meetings of the Logistics Working Group will be held on Wednesday 22 February and Wednesday 8 March.
• The Sub- Groups meetings are planned to take place between 27 February and 3 March. Invitations will be sent to Organisations once scheduled.
• NGOs and organisations interested in joining the Logistics Working Group can contact UNJLC via drc.info@unjlc.org

2.    AVIATION

Air safety evaluation

• Following the receipt of the reports of the air safety evaluation facilitated by UNJLC and carried out by IATA, WFP Air safety and DRC CAA experts in December 2005, recommendations were made by the Humanitarian Coordinator a.i during the ISMT meeting of 8 February 2006: The policy remains that three companies closely meet the requirements, namely Hewa Bora, Fillair and Air Tropiques.
• UNJLC aviation expert has paid a visit to all the evaluated companies. He invited them to plan out a strategy in order to address the identified shortcomings and to catch up with IATA standards.
• The possibility of a post-evaluation in the near future to assess if improvements will have been made is under consideration.

3.    GEOGRAPHIC INFORMATIONS SYSTEMS

• The GIS Working Group coordinated by UNJLC is in the final stages of its work on GIS databases updating.
• On Friday 17 February, UNJLC presented a progress report during a meeting gathering all the UN agencies, MONUC, NGOs and National Institutions involved in the GIS Working Group. The aim of the meeting was also to discuss about the way to perpetuate the updating and sharing of the GIS databases when the UNJLC exits from the DRC. 
• Two meetings of the GIS Sub Working Groups took place during the last couple of weeks: 
• On 15 February 2006, the Sub Working Group on cities and villages met. The aim of the meeting was to get a progress presentation by Monuc GIS unit which coordinates the sub-group. The latest file received by the group seems to be more comprehensive than the others. It was sent by "programme de lutte contre la trypanosomiase". The final file on the cities and villages will be sent by Monuc by the beginning of March and UNJLC will do the formatting in compliance with the global model.
• On 16 February 2006, the Sub Working on Communications network met. The purpose was to present the progress report on the updating of the database on roads, The sub group has yet to define with Office des Routes(the Road Authority of the DRC) how updated information on the state of roads can be included in the databases on a continuous basis.
  As national institution were represented in the meeting. The group also validated the final results of the airports, railways and rivers databases.

• The next Sub Working Groups meetings will take place as follows:
• The sub Working Group on cities and villages will be meeting on Tuesday 16 March 2006 at Villa OCHA.
• The Sub Working Group on communication network will be meeting on Wednesday 15 March 2006 at Villa OCHA.

• On 14 March 2006, The Catholic University of Louvain, Gent University, The Belgian "Politique scientifique federale" and the DRC Institute of Geography with the support of the Belgian Embassy will be organizing an event gathering Congolese and Belgian scientists in order to restore national maps to DRC. The event will take place at 02.30 P.M at the CEDESURK (Centre de Documentation et de l'Enseignement Superieur de la Region de Kinshasa).

  A presentation of the GIS Working Group project coordinated by UNJLC will be on the agenda.

ROUTE OPTIMIZATION MODEL (ROM)

• The Route Optimization Model (ROM) was presented during the HAG meeting held on Friday 17 February, it was also presented to the participants in the GIS meeting that took place the same day.
• The ROM is a tool that has been designed by TNT in collaboration with WFP and UNJLC. The aim of the tool is primarily to calculate the humanitarian transport cost reduction obtained thanks to infrastructure rehabilitation. It is also aimed at calculating the optimal route for humanitarian cargo. The ROM can therefore assist both donors and logistics officers in their daily work. UNJLC is planning to deploy the tool in DRC once accurate data will have been gathered and entered to run the model.