ISLAMABAD: The National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA) has started preparations to deal with floods in the monsoon season.

“Though it is not possible to accurately predict the intensity of rains in the monsoon, Pakistan has been facing disasters in the form of floods for almost a decade,” NDMA Chairman Major General Asghar Nawaz told Dawn at the concluding ceremony of a three-day “Disaster management simulation/training” programme at a local hotel on Friday.

The event was organised by the NDMA in collaboration with the World Food Programme (WFP) and sponsored by the Australian Aid.

Officers from across the country trained to deal with disasters

Officers responsible for disaster management from all over the country were trained on how to deal with a disaster.

Gen Nawaz said the Met Office was capable to accurately forecast the weather of one week and can predict if there would be rain or not in the next about three months but it cannot predict the quantity and intensity of the precipitation.

“Moreover, if we have rain in the central Punjab it does not become the reason for floods. The problem starts when rain starts in the catchments areas of the rivers. Last year, we had delayed rains but this year we will be in a position to predict rains in June,” he said.

However, he added, review conferences to deal with floods had been started in February. It was also decided to train the officers who deal with flood emergencies.

Earlier, speaking to the participants, Gen Nawaz said disasters were bound to happen but we can predict them.

“It is the job of the managers to decrease the impact of the destruction in case of a disaster and save human lives. The managers should have the capacity to absorb the shock of the disaster and then deal with it. The Disaster managers should come up with the most suitable response to a disaster,” he said.

Australian High Commission’s representative Kate Graham said Australia believed that an investment should be made to deal with disasters because mostly women and children were affected by disasters.

Country director WFP Lolo Castro said the WFP had been working with the NDMA to respond to natural disasters.

“Natural disasters affect food security, women and children so we should be ready to deal with them,” she said.

One of the participants of the training programme, Kashif Nabi, who is also the assistant commissioner of Jaffarabad in Balochistan, told Dawn that they were trained on how to act and react at the time of a disaster.

“Jaffarabad is one of the most flood vulnerable districts in Balochistan. The district witnessed floods in 2010 and 2012 during which people were relocated,” he said.

Published in Dawn, April 18th, 2015

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