‘NDMA revising building codes to save precious lives during disasters’

Karachi

The National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA) is revising building codes for entire Pakistan, especially for the areas prone to deadly earthquakes. The authority is also trying to impose criminal penalties over violators of the building codes to prevent loss of precious human lives in case of natural disasters.

In addition to that, the disaster management authority is building capacity of the media and training journalists in playing an effective role in search and rescue missions, disaster preparedness, awareness of masses and ultimately saving precious lives in case of natural and man-made calamities.

This was said by Engr Syed Ayub Shah, NDMA Director Information and Communication Technologies, while speaking at a media workshop on reporting disasters at a local hotel on Saturday.

The workshop was organised by the NDMA in collaboration with Unicef to enhance capacity of media personnel on reporting of the natural disasters.

The NDMA communication expert said media could play an important role in saving precious lives by conveying valuable information to people trapped in a disaster-hit area.

He also urged the media personnel to enhance their capacity of reporting natural and man-made disasters to play their role affectively during calamities.

He claimed that due to its unique topography, Pakistan was prone to all kinds of natural disasters, including strong earthquakes in the Northern areas, extreme drought in Balochistan and Sindh, strong floods in plains of Punjab and Sindh, flash floods in hilly areas, Tsunamis and Cyclones in the coastal areas of Sindh and Balochistn and deadly heat waves in Sindh, Punjab, Balochistan and some areas of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

According to him, the frequency of natural disasters had intensified during the last 10 to 12 years and in this period, around 1.2 million people were killed, 2.9 billion were affected and a damage of 1.7 trillion US dollars was done due to different types of natural disasters, including earthquakes, tsunamis, floods and forest fires.

“The climate change is resulting in extreme weather patterns all over the world as the overall temperature in the world has increased 1.4 degrees Celsius since the start of the last century. Pakistan is on the 8th place in the Global Climate Risk Index and it is also one of the most affected countries due to climate change in the world”, he informed.

Pakistan had faced worst kind of disasters during the last 11 years, including mega earthquake of 2005, super floods in 2010 and 2011, heavy rains and flash floods in 2013 and deadly heatwave in 2015 in Karachi, he added.

The NDMA expert maintained that due to population density, the lack of awareness and education and absence of any proper training, Pakistan was prone to have massive casualties in case of natural disasters in the future and in order to prepare and mitigate, the NDMA was planning to train and sensitise media in the first phase of its preparedness mission.

“We cannot fight with natural disasters but can prevent, mitigate and prepare ourselves against the likely impacts that may occur during any disaster. In this regard, information exchange with the general masses through regular media reporting on natural disasters can play a pivotal role in saving manly lives”, he maintained.

Another NDMA expert, Ahmed Kamal, said Pakistan was blessed with a very well informed, vibrant and active media on national as well as regional level that had always played a crucial role during any natural disaster situation.