Danish Demining Group (DDG) is part of the Danish Refugee Council (DRC) – a non-profit and non-governmental organization working to protect and to provide long-lasting solutions to communities affected by war and armed conflict.

DDG was established in 1997 by four organizations – Danish Refugee Council, Caritas, ASF and UNICEF – with the aim of building up a Danish non-political and non-profit organization to respond to international tasks within Humanitarian Mine Action.

In 2004, DDG became a separate Mine Action department under the Danish Refugee Council (DRC), and in 2007 it was further integrated with DRC International. Besides economies of scale, the intention of merging the two organizations was to promote synergies in cooperation but not be limited by the same.

Mine Action in the Wider Humanitarian Context
DDG regards the problems of landmines and ERW in relation to and as a consequence of man-made disaster and armed conflict. Hence, reducing risk and securing safety of communities is not just about implementing mine action activities but must be integrated into a wider understanding of ‘why’ activities at all, and how these mine action activities can ensure further development and risk reduction in other sectors, e.g. access to water and food security.

How DDG operations work
DDG Mine Action has gained competencies within the areas of:

• Community Liaison (CL)
• Survey. Both socio-economic and technical data collection
• Mine Risk Education (MRE)
• Mine Clearance - both manual and mechanical
• Removal of Explosive Remnants of War (ERW). This can be Explosive Ordnance Disposal (EOD), which can be demolition of anything from one identified item (Unexploded Ordnance – UXO) to a big stockpile of ammunition. It can also be Battle Area Clearance (BAC), which are areas contaminated with scattered exploded and unexploded ammunition.
• Mine Marking. This also includes marking of dangerous areas containing. items that are not mines, but e.g. Unexploded Ordnance (UXO).
• Risk Management
• Area Reduction (through mine detection dogs (MDD))
• Victim Assistance
• Armed Violence Reduction
• Small Arms Light Weapons
• Advocacy
• Gender policies
• Capacity building of national staff and organisations

How these components interact with each other and support the programme as a whole depends on the needs identified and the tasking put forward to DDG.

The composition of teams and how much time should be allocated to the different components can vary depending on the country and context in which DDG operates. What is important is the liaison and connectedness with the community where the DDG teams are working. Without acceptance and information sharing with the community, the feasibility for success of implementation in any given community is low.