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Old Monday, November 29, 2010
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Lacking disaster

management skills


Will government departments be able to adequately respond to climate change in future?

By Shakeel Ahmed

Floods have caused a devastating impact on national economic and social fabric of Pakistan. Government of Pakistan, United Nations and its agencies, INGOs, National NGOs, World Bank, Asian Development Bank and others are busy in calculating and estimating the loss — economic, social and environmental.

Now the government and its partners are planning to move ahead from rescue and relief to rehabilitation. A numbers of strategies are on the table to pave the way for focused and targeted rehabilitation work. The government and United Nations are trying to secure sufficient resources to complete the daunting challenge.

At this moment, the government lacks the resources due to weak economy and continuous war on terror. At the same time, the government is also facing problems to secure funds from the international community and it seems it will impact the speed and spectrum of government’s interventions.

Apart from financial resources, recent floods in Pakistan also initiated the debate that either Pakistan has a well-managed, operated and organized institutional mechanism to face natural calamities.

Pakistan has created a number of departments, e.g. Flood Commission of Pakistan, National Crisis Cell, etc, and now National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA) of Pakistan. The NDMA was created after 2005 earthquake and before 2005, there no other agency to deal with huge disasters.

The purpose of creation of these departments and agencies was to provide timely rescue and relief services and minimize the impact of disasters in different areas. However, these departments and agencies could not deliver according to the perceived objectives. Recent floods further exposed the entire system of disaster management in Pakistan.

The NDMA has produced a very good document which describes a good strategy to deal with disasters. It covers earthquake, floods, droughts, etc, and talks about different ways to handle disasters. However, there is lack of workable plan and, most importantly, required skills to deal with disasters. NDMA spread its network to district level however necessary resources are lacked at national level.

The flood commission of Pakistan was created in January 1977 to tackle the issue of flood at the national level in the best way. The flood cell was created in the Flood Commission to handle the flood solely and take effective measures to mitigate impact of floods.

The Commission was also entrusted with the responsibility to prepare plan and workable strategies to prevent or minimize the impact of floods. Flood cell was further strengthened with presence of Civil Engineering Cell, Dams Safety Councils.

Federal Flood Commission (FFC) never delivered according to the expectations and perceived objectives. Floods have badly exposed the poor status and performance of FFC. During floods there was very limited presence of FFC. It was the responsibility of FFC to ensure maintenance of levies to control or minimize the impact of floods.

Coordination among different tiers was altogether missing, although the prime objective of creation of FFC was national coordination. Story of other departments and agencies, e.g., emergency relief cell, national crises management cell, etc, is not different.

Pakistan ranks high on vulnerability level to climate change. It is predicted that natural disasters, e.g. floods, droughts, etc, will increase in number and the spectrum would be large. Now the most pertinent question is will these agencies and departments be able to manage climate change-related disasters in future? In the present scenario, a simple answer is a big no.

Climate Change will increase the frequency and severity of disasters in future. Pakistan will be facing more disasters and extent of impact would be higher. Agriculture is major source of livelihood for majority of people and climate change is posing major threat to agriculture. Flood in 2010 also destroyed and damaged physical infrastructure, industry sources of communication etc.

In addition to that there is also question, why in the presence of these agencies and departments Pakistan is not able to manage the disasters, in any form. Why the role of Pakistani Media and NGOs is is more prominent than Government’s dedicated agencies and departments?

Disasters Management related institutions lack proper planning and future strategies. For example, there is no evacuation strategy with any department and if there is any strategy that is only on papers. Evacuation strategy needs proper layout of safe sites, safe passages for timely shifting and rescue, dedicated and well trained staff etc.

In Pakistan, no department has any safe sites, safe passages for timely shifting and rescue, dedicated and well trained staff etc. Recent disasters, e.g. earthquake 2005 and flood 2010, are prime examples. Pakistan Army was only organized institute which helped government in rescue and relief activities. Army also helped the government after the 2005 earthquake rehabilitation work and now is working with government in rehabilitation work for flood affected people. Civil society and media are also playing a major role.

As it was aforementioned that Pakistan is highly vulnerable to climate change, so the natural calamities especially the floods, droughts will increase in intensity and frequency. Therefore, now government has to revisit its departments and agencies to cope the challenges of disasters. Planning and strategies should be shifted from the conventional practices to innovative practices. Following steps can be taken to prepare and cope with the challenge of predictable and unpredictable disasters.

First, develop policy at national level for coordination but transferred powers at district or tehsil level for implementation and proper execution of policies and activities. Also provide the essential infrastructure, financial resources and skilled manpower to perform this job. Emergency decision making power should also be transferred at local level.

Second, map the whole country into different zones on the basis of disaster vulnerability. After zoning the country local authorities, dedicated for management, should be strengthened and provided necessary resources. Third, local authorities should prepare all the plans e.g. preparedness, evacuation plan, mapping of city, identification temporary and permanent shelters, medical assistance, food assistance etc.

These are few and simple steps which government can take and revamp the system and make it more efficient. However, it requires political and bureaucratic will to devise and implement right policies to cope the disasters. There are a number of international strategies and plans are available which can be replicated in Pakistan. California State of USA has a very good plan and implementation strategy which can be replicated in Pakistan. California has close geographically similarities with Pakistan, so it will make our work easy.
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