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DMS Foundation (Disaster Management Services) is a Canadian-based not-for-profit charitable organization, whose primary mission is to identify and support the implementation of fully-integrated emergency preparedness programs that mitigate and prevent losses caused by natural and man-made disasters.

DMS Foundation was formed out of recognition that when major natural and man-made disasters occur, much needed help arrives too late and tends to be disproportionate to local needs at the time of delivery (wrong material, wrong time, wrong place). In 1996, Debarati Guha-Sapir, director of the Belgium-based Centre for Research on the Epidemiology of Disasters (“CRED”) said “Past experience has shown that 8 to 12 hours is the maximum delay within which to extricate trapped persons, if they are to survive”. Yet international search-and rescue teams continually arrive too late—often days after the disaster has occurred, citing the mud-slides that occurred in El Salvador. The lesson that never gets learned, according to Guha-Sapir, is that “community preparedness is the only practical solution for poor countries located in high-risk areas. The locals are the ones who can bring any effective help in the first few hours and it is their capacity that has to be strengthened. This is less heroic than flying in after the event waving a fist-full of dollars. Local community–based prevention and disaster mitigation programs are less costly and more effective” says Ms. Guha-Sapir.

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