UN agency cautions river bank settlers

GENEVA: The UN disaster prevention agency said on Friday that communities should have been kept away from flood-exposed river banks in Pakistan, as it underlined the human hand in a string of catastrophes.

.The ISDR also pointed to landslides in China, wildfires in Russia and drought in Niger as examples of how communities and towns were increasingly placed or left in harm’s way.

“The vulnerability of human settlements is on the rise and is not yet being addressed by governments or communities,” added Briceno.

Briceno argued that while extreme weather or climate change and poverty added to the challenges, the biggest source of harm was people living in hazard-prone areas while too little was done to reduce the risks they face.

“It is clearly human responsibility in the making of the disaster; disasters are not natural,” he added, urging local authorities, donors and aid agencies to bolster long-term steps to cut those risks with the recovery.

Briceno acknowledged that all four countries were doing something but the pace of change was too slow and scattered worldwide.

It was also hampered by poverty, war and displacement, notably in Pakistan, and a focus on the response to disasters rather than preventing their impact.

The UN official noted that the South Asian country confronted annual monsoon rains, faced added melting from Himalayan glaciers with global warming and disruptive shifts in weather patterns.

“There are clearly, from nature’s perspective, some aggravating factors. But the reality is that those river banks should never have been (open) for people to settle on,” Briceno said, calling it a known risk.

He nonetheless praised Pakistan’s flood alert system and the response by the National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA).

“What is worrying is the long-term effect - the displacement. By moving they might go to other risk areas,” such as fragile slopes or quake zones, Briceno said.

Published in The Express Tribune August 21^st, 2010.