The Anticipating and Responding to Disasters Masterclass, organized by KUNO, Platform for Humanitarian Knowledge Exchange, will take place on 19 November 2026 in The Hague, Netherlands. The event brings together people working in humanitarian action, policy, and research to discuss how better preparation and early action can help reduce the impacts of disasters. Through talks, discussions, and workshops, participants will share experiences and explore ways to put anticipatory action into practice. HeiGIT will contribute with a Mapping with Communities workshop led by Anne Schauss and Diego Pajarito Grajales, focusing on how local knowledge and participatory mapping can support disaster risk management.
Workshop: Mapping with Communities
Workshop leaders: Anne Schauss (HeiGIT) and Diego Pajarito Grajales (Urban Big Data Centre, University of Glasgow)
Disaster risks are complex, and approaches that rely mainly on information from institutions do not always capture what communities experience on the ground. Bringing local knowledge into disaster planning and early warning systems can help address this gap. Community mapping creates opportunities for people to share their knowledge, discuss risks, and contribute to decisions that affect them. However, making this knowledge useful beyond the mapping process is not always straightforward. Local insights need to reach decision makers in formats they can use and trust. Community maps also have value beyond the geographic information they contain. They can start conversations, bring different perspectives together, and help communities and organizations better understand local risks. In this workshop, participants will look at these challenges through case studies and shared experiences. They will explore participatory mapping approaches, digital tools, and questions around data fairness and digital sovereignty, with a focus on how community knowledge can play a stronger role in disaster risk management.
More information and registration: KUNO: Anticipating and Responding to Disasters