BEIJING, Oct 3: Pakistan, China and other regional countries will jointly implement an action plan to strengthen early warning system, reducing risk of disaster like typhoons, tropical cyclones and seasonal floods.

It also aimed at controlling human and socio-economic losses in the wake of natural disaster. The regional countries also agreed to consolidate contingency and disaster relief planning to mitigate the losses.

The plan was approved here at the concluded session of three-day Asian Conference on Disaster Reduction. Delegates from 42 countries participated.

The meeting was organized to facilitate the implementation of the Hyogo Framework for Action 2005-2015, developed at the World Conference on Disaster Reduction (WCDR).

Pakistan was represented at the conference by the cabinet secretary Ejaz Rahim and director general Meteorological Department Dr Qamar-uz-Zaman.

Under the action plan, the regional countries are required to prepare and modify contingency plans regularly for efficient and effective disaster response at community and national levels to reduce the loss of human lives.

The plan emphasised that the cooperative contingency planning is particularly important when responding to large-scale or trans-boundary disasters. It called for enhancing the resilience of critical facilities and infrastructure for disaster preparedness and reduction.

Meanwhile, Pakistan and China signed an accord to develop bilateral cooperation in meteorological field, helping each other for weather and climate forecast.

The agreement was inked by Yanchao Hong, a senior official of Chinese Academy of Sciences and Dr Qamar-uz-Zaman. The secretary and ambassador to China Salman Bashir were also present at the signing ceremony, held here at the Pakistan Embassy.—APP