Prepare for disaster and save lives - UNDP report

To save millions of lives, African nations and other developing countries need to anticipate and reduce the risk from natural disasters, the UN Development Programme (UNDP) said in a report launched on Tuesday in Nairobi, Kenya. The report, titled "Reducing Disaster Risk: A Challenge for Development", focuses on how development configures disaster risk, both positively and negatively. It was also launched on Monday in Quito, Ecuador, and in Washington D.C. and on Tuesday in Geneva. The UNDP Bureau for Crisis Prevention and Recovery prepared the report that analyses global data from the past two decades, which indicate that death and destruction caused by natural disasters in poor countries could be averted by better planning and systematic risk analysis. In a presentation on the report, the UNDP regional disaster reduction adviser for Africa, Kenneth Westgate, said the report sought to identify policies that could lead to a reduction in the impact of natural disasters on the population. "Disaster risk can be managed and reduced," he said. "The UNDP is suggesting that there is a real opportunity now to address disaster risk in a positive way to support poverty reduction, the Millennium Development Goals and all those other major development initiatives that lay open to destruction by disaster events." Describing the report as groundbreaking, the director of the UNDP's Drylands Development Centre, Philip Dobie, said for many years, people had dealt with the aftermath of disaster but failed to recognise that if properly managed, development could prevent natural events from becoming humanitarian disasters. "Take, for instance, the case of floods. Over 196 million people in more than 90 countries are exposed annually to the risk of floods," he said. "However, floods turn into humanitarian disasters mostly among poor communities, with low population densities, where disaster preparedness and early warning are non-existent." Dobie said the natural disaster that affects Africa more than any other is drought. "And drought is the most pernicious disaster - one that creeps up on us quietly and leaves large sectors of society devastated." He added: "Fortunately, the message of today's report is that we can do a great deal to improve the situation. It is time to stop treating disaster as an unexpected occurrence that inevitably causes death and destruction. It is time to recognise the role of development in reducing effects of disasters." UN experts have described the report as the most extensive study ever published of global trends in exposure, risk and vulnerability to natural disasters. The report features a Disaster Risk Index (DRI), which introduces a new method to measure global disaster and to enable experts to measure and compare physical exposure to hazard, vulnerability and risk between countries. The DRI demonstrates the link between human development and death rates following natural disasters. The most common natural disaster are tropical cyclones, floods earthquake and drought. [The UNDP report is available online at: www.undp.org]