CHITRAL: Speakers at different workshops here said that devastations of glacial lake outburst flood (Glof) could be mitigated by preparedness of the local community on scientific lines and making them resilient.

The workshops were held separately for the sub-valleys of Arkari and Madak Lusht on ‘resilience against the glacial lake outburst flood (GLOF) threats’ by Glof-II project of UNDP.

The trainers said that the aim of the second phase of the project was to devise community-based disaster risk management. They said that the vulnerable communities were being strengthened by imparting training and providing necessary resources to them.

They said that in the recent past, Glof caused large scale disaster in Golen as it washed away infrastructures worth of billions of rupees including the 108 megawatts hydropower project, water supply scheme, road and bridges. They said that no human loss occurred in the area as early warning system had been put in place in the first phase of the project.

They said that Chitral was home to 549 glaciers out of which 132 were declared sensitive and 10 as hyper sensitive in which global warming factor acted as catalyst.

The trainers said that communities in the proximity of the hypersensitive glaciers needed to be enabled to cope with the possible outbursts of the glaciers so that human loss could be averted and the magnitude of their suffering could be mitigated to the minimum possible level.

During the three days of the workshops, sessions of practical works were also held in which training on first aid and management of emergency situations was imparted to the participants so that they could be able to cope with the post outburst situation of the glacial outburst.

Abdul Wali Khan, the additional deputy commissioner, gave away certificates to the participants of the workshop. He admired the contribution of the UNDP project and said that it was designed in such a manner that the community was fully engaged in all steps of its implementation.

Published in Dawn, December 7th, 2020