Organizations acquire, store, and inventory resources for both normal operations and incidents.

Effective resource management requires a current, accurate resource inventory to track resource status and availability.

This inventory can be as simple as a paper spreadsheet or as advanced as computer-based inventory systems.

Accurate resource inventories:

• Enable organizations to resource incidents promptly when needed
• Support day-to-day resource management

In NIMS, resource inventorying refers to preparedness activities conducted outside of incident response; resource tracking occurs during an incident.