Almost four weeks after the devastating South Asia tsunami, Tearfund is urging governments not to waste the opportunity afforded by this week's World Conference on Disaster Reduction to save millions of lives from future natural disasters.
Despite the generous response to the recent South Asia disaster, millions of people are still at risk of a similar fate unless governments invest greater resources into ensuring vulnerable communities are equipped to cope with future disasters.
Speaking from the conference in Kobe, Japan, Sarah La Trobe, Tearfund’s Policy Adviser says, “We are very concerned that the document governments are working on at this conference is unambitious and fails to include any firm commitments. How many more people have to die before governments start to take this seriously?”
Tearfund is calling on governments to accept binding targets to halve the number of deaths from environmental disasters by the year 2015 and to increase resources committed to building community resilience to disasters.
Tearfund is calling for:
- the implementation of nationwide public awareness and education campaigns on how communities can protect themselves from disaster risks.
- information on disaster risks and protection to be incorporated in the national curriculum of primary and secondary schools in disaster-prone developing countries by 2010
- every disaster-prone country to adopt a policy and strategic plan for disaster prevention by the end of 2006
- every disaster-prone country to integrate disaster prevention into its poverty reduction policies and programmes by the end of 2007
- all emergency response, recovery and rehabilitation processes to reduce vulnerability to future disasters
Commenting on international efforts to prepare Indian Ocean nations for future tsunamis, Sarah La Trobe adds: “We welcome plans to protect the Indian Ocean from future disasters like the recent tsunami. But these measures need to be put in place before disasters strike. If we only ever pledge money after a disaster, thousands more lives will be wasted before we have enough disaster prevention measures in place.”
The World Conference on Disaster Reduction started on 18 January in Kobe, Japan - ten years on from the devastating earthquake which hit the city - and closes on 22 January.
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