The responsibility of requesting, registering, authorizing and monitoring foreign medical assistance lies with the national health authorities (usually Ministry of Health) and the National Emergency Management authority (NEMA) in the host country. This task is becoming increasingly more difficult by the rapidly increasing number of FMTs deploying, announced and unannounced, to provide medical services. Few national co-ordinators are familiar with the respective capacities of those teams. As part of the FMT initiative, the Global Health cluster resolved to create an international register of FMT provider organizations. The global register aims to allow faster and more directed deployment of FMTs, allowing disaster affected countries to readily identify and approve FMTs from the register. This in turn would lead to a better matching of supply and demand, and stronger interaction of FMTs with national authority. It would also provide a standardized tool from which host governments can better target response by selected invitation to teams able to meet required needs.