Governments must act now to prevent further deaths
A Tearfund report, One Disaster Too Many (PDF, 905K), launched on the opening day of the World Conference on Disaster Reduction in Japan, says that governments are scrimping in their efforts to minimize the devastating effects of disasters. The report urges Governments to accept binding targets and commit resources at the Conference this week, which runs until 22 January.
The report also argues that lives could have been saved in the South Asia tsunami, if simple and cost-effective measures had been put in place to protect vulnerable communities and prepare people to save their own lives.
“This conference provides a golden opportunity to take decisions that could save millions of lives from future environmental disasters,” says Marcus Oxley, Tearfund’s Disaster Management Director from Kobe.
“In light of the tsunami, and mounting expert opinion that increasing climate change will make poor countries increasingly vulnerable to a range of environmental disasters, it is crucial that governments make concrete commitments at Kobe.”
Tearfund is very concerned that the draft agreement for Kobe conference is unambitious and fails to grasp both the scale of increased human vulnerability to natural disasters or the urgent need to fund measures to reduce this vulnerability.
Alex Joseph, a Tearfund partner worker who has been responding to the tsunami in India since Bosing Day is at the Kobe conference this week. He says: “It is indefensible and illogical not to help poor communities prevent and prepare for disasters when very often, thousands of lives could be saved by even the simplest of measures. We work with many vulnerable communities in flood prone areas and simple, cost effective measures such as early warning systems, evacuation and rescue training and first aid save hundreds of lives each year.”
“It’s not rocket science” adds Marcus Oxley, “Communities can prepare for disasters by building flood shelters, creating stores of non-perishable food and emergency supplies in a safe place and setting up early warning and evacuation systems. Such preparation is vital because most lives are saved in the first 48 hours of a natural disaster. Very often, as is the case for rapid onset disasters such as this most recent one in Asia, the first emergency relief aid from the international community does not arrive until a few days after the disaster. The local people are always the ones that must respond quickly to a disaster.”
One Disaster Too Many warns that the number of people affected by natural disasters - like the recent Tsunami in South Asia which has claimed over 150,000 lives; the earthquake in Bam, Iran in which at least 25,000 people died in December 2003 and the floods which brought widespread devastation to Mozambique four years ago this month - are on the increase.
Tearfund’s report argues that, with disasters increasing in number, long-term development in poor countries is being seriously threatened.
Research carried out by Tearfund among major donors, including the United Nations, the European Union and the governments of Britain, the United States and Canada, shows that there is general agreement that preventing disasters makes economic and moral sense. But as One Disaster Too Many shows, governments’ approaches are still weighted towards ‘bandaging wounds’ rather than ‘preventing injuries’ because:
- Lack of Understanding: Many working in the development sector of government lack an understanding of the relevance of reducing the risk of disasters to their work.
- Lack of Ownership: development and relief professionals in governments often see the job of reducing the risk of disasters as primarily the responsibility of the other discipline.
- Competition: the sheer pressure of responding to other international aid needs such as HIV/Aids and conflict means that time and money are stretched.
“In Britain, other European nations and the US, millions of pounds are invested into reducing the risks associated floods, droughts and earthquakes, yet we spend very little on helping poor communities do the same,” says Sarah La Trobe, Tearfund Policy Officer and the report’s author.
“The tsunami in Asia has shown that there is now an urgent moral and financial imperative for governments and financial institutions to adopt new thinking and action about aid budgets and programmes. Money and expertise must be urgently directed into reducing the risks of disasters in order to help the world’s most vulnerable communities safeguard their lives and their way out of poverty.”
Tearfund will be hosting an event at Kobe “Turning Policy into Practice” on Friday 21st January, 12.15-2.15pm as well as launching a report which gives governments and aid agencies guidance on how to implement disaster prevention measures.