#immap

[ Issue 24.2 ] 

The Republic of Iraq remains severely contaminated with explosive ordnance (EO) according to the Landmine and Cluster Munition Monitor report 2019. Located in southern Iraq, the Iraq Directorate of Mine Action’s (DMA) Regional Mine Action Center South’s (RMAC-S) area of responsibility contains the most contaminated area in Iraq in terms of surface area. The region’s hazard areas recorded in the national mine action database (IMSMA) stood at 1,592 sq km by mid-July 2020, with the Basra Province alone containing 1.27 billion sq m of hazard area. This contamination predominantly originates from various armed conflicts in the region, ranging mostly from the Iran-Iraq War in the 1980s to the 2003 Iraq War. The region has seen relatively little conflict with Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), which bodes well for regional security but means funding for conventional minefield clearance is limited.

From a natural hazard perspective, the region is exposed to a range of natural and human-induced disasters, e.g., droughts, floods, sand-storms, desertification, and various epidemics. Compounding the situation is the country’s poor economic situation, infrastructure, and unreliable internet connectivity. In addition to navigating the contamination hazards mentioned previously, RMAC-S is tasked with prioritizing land release activities based on, inter alia, the socioeconomic status, population vulnerability, and development sectors’ activities that are restricted by the hazardous areas within each district. The presence of minefields in the region’s large oil fields, on which the government relies heavily, further hampers the effective management of mine action resources available to RMAC-S.

ROLE OF MANAGEMENT INFORMATION SYSTEMS

Timely access to relevant information is a key enabler for effective decision-making in any organization and even more so when these decisions affect lives and livelihoods. Since 2004, iMMAP has supported and developed the humanitarian mine action (HMA) program’s information management (IM) systems, delivered capacity building activities and facilitated coordination on IM, planning and prioritization between the DMA and other HMA actors in Iraq. Balancing  the access restrictions and security requirements imposed by the government on the national mine action database contents, DMA’s activities created an array of information products that provided decision makers with easier access to data subsets, assisting with data analysis and the contextualization of the hazard areas. The previous system resulted in delayed responses from fully-taxed personnel when staff from RMAC-S operations are met with urgent requests for planning or mine action tasks submitted by implementing partners. The shortfalls of the national budget contribute to the difficulty of retaining skilled national IM staff, complicating the DMA’s operating capacity, and further delaying the output of (paper-based) field report submissions stemming from the problematic infrastructure.

The country’s very first digital congress, the “IMMAP DigiCon, The Power of X: Digital Multiplied,” hosted by the Internet and Mobile Marketing Association of the Philippines (IMMAP), lived up to its promise to be as enlightening and exciting as the first event hosted by IMMAP 10 years ago.

“This groundbreaking event is like no other that IMMAP has hosted in the past—more attendees, more learning tracks and most importantly, an even bigger line-up of speakers who talked about everything digital in the 21st Century. Collectively, they shared their thoughts on this industry that is taking the world by storm,” says Donald Lim, Chief Digital Officer of ABS-CBN and touted as the founding father of digital marketing in the country.

The digital landscape in the Philippines continues to evolve at an unprecedented pace; as such, the congress is the perfect venue for the country’s digital marketers to keep in step and to learn from digital marketing experts from all over the world, who shared their knowledge during the 3-day event from October 10-12, 2016 at the Philippine International Convention Center (PICC)

“More industries today are now going purely digital and we are expecting the this kind of transformation among many more companies in the future,” Lim adds.

For the first time, through “The Power of X: Digital Multiplied,” IMMAP fuses together other regular digital marketing conferences—the Mobile Marketing Summit, Digital Commerce Summit, and the IMMAP Summit—into one event, drew thousands delegates from various industries across the country. Lim says this congress was 10 times bigger than before as IMMAP once again enjoins members of the Philippine digital marketing industry and demonstrates to them how brands can grow exponentially with the power of digital, multiplied. Why “Power of X?” Lim explains that“X” is one of the most powerful letters in the alphabet. It has many possible usages, but it also stands for the unknown. “When it comes to digital, it’s up to you to determine what ‘X’ stands for.

In many ways, digital is still misunderstood, and so it gets the ‘X’ mark or is crossed out of an advertiser’s consideration list. How will you be able to amplify your brand in the digital space? It’s for you to define your ‘X,’” he says. The IMMAP DigiCon had 10 subject matter tracks and 10 speakers in each track, for a total of 100 speakers. The topics for the 10 tracks include “Branding and Marketing,” “Content and Distribution,” “Start-ups,” “Creatives,” “Social and Search,” “eCommerce and Payment,” “Marketing Technology,” “CRM, Data and Analytics,” “Research and Measurement,” and “Media and Ad Networks.”

The likes of Dan Neary, Vice President for Asia of Facebook, Wendy Hogan, Head of Strategy and Marketing Transformation of Oracle, and chief executives of local companies like Ernest Cu, CEO of Globe Telecom, Kenneth Yang, President and CEO of Golden Arches Development Corp., Fred Uytengsu, President and CEO of Alaska Milk Corp., were featured during the plenary sessions. 

Meanwhile, Sunita Kaur of Spotify, Anna Liechtenstein, Global Chief Strategy Officer of Havas Media, Paul Azzola, COO of PayMaya Philippines, Guy Hearn, Chief Innovation Officer of Omnicom Media Group, Simon Kahn, Chief Marketing Officer of Google Asia Pacific, Gwendolyn Regina, Head of Strategy and Business Development of Asia Mashable, and Sandhya Devanathan of Facebook SEA, to name a few, are just some of the more than the 100 speakers who provide the learning and sharing of knowledge on digital marketing in the 21st Century.