The U.N. World Conference on Disaster Reduction, which opened in Kobe, needs to set objective targets for reduction of damage from floods and other water-related disasters.
The conference, a forum for discussion about new strategies to prevent damage from natural disasters, marks the 10th anniversary of the Great Hanshin Earthquake.
The Indian Ocean tsunami catastrophe in December, which claimed more than 200,000 lives, has driven increased interest at the conference in measures for water-related disasters and greater ministerial attendance.
Greater rainfall due to climate change and the concentration of people in developing nations living in swamp lands or near rivers has meant the number of flood victims around the world has grown rapidly since 1990, with more than 90 percent of victims in Asia.
Floods increase the risk of infectious diseases and reinforce poverty, destabilizing factors in developing countries. The situation may result in poverty stricken communities becoming recruiting grounds for terrorist organizations.
Measures to fight poverty and resolve water shortages are included in the U.N. Millennium Development Goals and other international agreements. But there is no international agreement on water-related disasters such as floods and tsunami because of a preconception that such disasters are difficult to predict as they occur with little warning.
Industrialized and developing nations, while enthusiastic about solving water-shortage problems, have not been able to agree over aid for flood damage.
But water-related disasters are easier to predict than earthquakes. Japan uses ground-based observation networks and weather satellites to predict torrential rain and issues early warnings about potential flooding.
Time lags before tsunami reach shorelines after earthquakes make it possible to evacuate people to higher ground. But early detection and warning systems are only effective if the public is educated about disaster evacuation procedures.
The United Nations University's Institute for Environment and Human Security said preventive and early warning measures account for only about 1 percent of spending on disaster relief.
The institute warned that damage from natural disasters will grow unless there is greater focus on preventive measures.
A cyclone in Bangladesh in 1991 killed more than 130,000 people. The country is regularly hit by catastrophic storms. But the death toll from a similar-sized cyclone in 1997 plummeted to 134 as a result of international cooperation for improved disaster awareness education and evacuation measures, including assistance from Japan.
The Bangladeshi government constructed 1,300 evacuation shelters in primary school buildings and introduced remote systems to collect data from rivers for flood forecasting.
At a meeting in December, the U.N. Advisory Board on Water and Sanitation, chaired by former Prime Minister Ryutaro Hashimoto, finalized a report for U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan calling for a target to halve the death toll from water-related disasters by 2015.
Although the meeting was held before the Indian Ocean tsunami disaster, the goal it set is an urgent task that needs to be agreed upon at the Kobe conference.
The international conference must be more than festival that ends with a decorative statement of abstract words. It has an urgent task to pave the way for future measures to reduce the damage from water-related disasters.
As host of the conference and a nation with much experience in natural disasters, achieving this goal will test Japan's leadership.
21 Janauary 2005 / The Daily Yomiuri Online
