Tokyo Metropolitan Government Officer Visits

Dr. Mark Smith met with Mr. Shogo Miyamoto a visiting  officer of Tokyo

Metropolitan Government on Wednesday, May 5th.

Dr. Smith discussed his research and activity in Disaster Management with

Mr. Miyamoto in Baton Rouge.  Mr. Miyamoto said, "I'm very interested in

the Louisiana Business Emergency Operations Center's activities based on

public private partnerships. In Japan, that kind of activity has not been

widespread so far. I'm interested in the role of each level of government

(federal , state  and city ) in the event of disaster."

Mr. Miyamoto is studying Public Policy and English at Georgetown University

in Washington D.C.  I'm researching "The policy lessons for  economic

recovery from disasters in the US - How to encourage small business -". The

results of my research will, hopefully, help Tokyo to recover from the

recent disaster.

They toured Baton Rouge and the Basin and discussed the lessons that

Louisiana has learned from its recent natural disasters.

Submitted by: Dr. Mark Smith, Management Department Head