International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies in partnership with The South African Red Cross Society
The Rosebank Hotel, Rosebank, Johannesburg

Guest Speaker
Mr L J Buys (Executive Manager: Disaster Management)

Honourable Guests, Ladies and Gentlemen

For sheer power, nature has no rival. The shifting of tectonic plates off the west coast of Sumatra on 26 December 2004 triggered a magnitude 9 earthquake, dwarfing all since 1964. It started 30 kilometres beneath the Burma plate, raising the seabed by several metres. Within hours, the seismic shock and tsunamis had killed at least 145,000 people in countries thousands of kilometres apart, and destroyed the homes of up to 5 million people.

We humans may be powerless to prevent such events, but there is much we can do to minimise the toll of death and destruction they cause.

When an emergency unfolds, collecting information on the needs of the affected population is a crucial step for quickly orienting the response and mobilizing the resources.

Coordinating the response however, is no doubt the most crucial aspect, as was clearly seen from the chaos experienced by affected countries when aircraft with rescue teams arrived and had nowhere to land and accommodating rescue teams caused even bigger problems. The intrigue, lack of coordination, communication and indecisiveness of policy-makers in the USA when Hurricane Katrina struck, caused untold misery due to a lack of timely response.

Tragedies such as this will be all the worse if we learn nothing from it. What good is rice if you have nothing to cook it in? What good is a Nordic sweater in tropical Sri Lanka? Fifty-five percent of Indians said the emergency clothing they were given offended their dignity, while 50 percent of Sri Lankans said the same about bedding and shelter. Lack of transport to carry relief supplies to affected people as well as adequate warehouse facilities, are but a few examples of the problems that well intended but uncoordinated relief aid caused.

Major tsunamis are rare in the Indian Ocean. Before December 2004, India had not seen one since 1945.

Tsunamis usually occur along the Pacific Ocean coasts of the “Ring of Fire”, and an effective tsunami warning system has long been in place there. However, although the extreme western edge of the “Ring of Fire” extends into the Indian Ocean (the point where this earthquake struck), no tsunami warning system existed in the Indian Ocean due to the rarity of tsunamis in that ocean – the last major one there was caused by the Krakatoa eruption of 1883.

Many lives could have been saved if the people knew about the warning signs of tsunami. In the minutes preceding a tsunami, the sea often recedes from the coast. For people in the Indian Ocean, where tsunami is rare, this rare sight induced people to visit the coast to investigate and collect fish stranded in exposed beach.

On Maikhao beach in Thailand, a 10 year old British girl, Tilly Smith, recognised the signs and warned her parents and others to leave the beach. This was one of the few areas where no-one was reported killed or seriously injured.

The importance of information and communication cannot be over-stressed. Early warning is still too often seen in terms of hazard forecasting, and is not fully recognised as an essential element of vulnerability reduction, poverty reduction and sustainable development.

Natural hazards, such as storms, droughts, volcanic eruptions, or earthquakes, need not spell disaster. A disaster occurs only if a community or population is exposed to the hazard and cannot cope with its effects. Torrential rain in the middle of the ocean will not cause a disaster, but the same heavy rainfall on a vulnerable informal settlement in a flood prone area may result in loss of life and livelihood. Good early warning systems need to consider community vulnerabilities as well as the hazards. The early warning signs of vulnerability are growing poverty, environmental degradation, populations crowded in risky locations, civil strife and lack of knowledge and preparedness.

Although the Earth system is constantly changing, ozone depletion, increases in atmospheric greenhouse gases, large-scale pollution and changing patterns of natural resource use, demonstrate that human activities are altering the Earth system at an accelerated pace. Awareness of this has led to an evolving international consensus on the importance of both increasing our scientific understanding of global change and linking scientific findings to policy decisions.

The latest spate of devastating disasters has also renewed the focus on disaster communications. When first responders arrived in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina, one of the biggest dangers they faced was their inability to communicate with each other. For instance, a team from the Maryland State Police Department was rescuing stranded residents when a military helicopter swooped down waving a plastic bottle out of the window. The bottle was thrown down and inside was a note warning of a dangerous gas leak just ahead of the rescue team.

Communication plays many vital roles in disaster reduction. While they often overlap, these roles may be divided into five broad categories –

• Technical communications systems, such as satellites, remote sensing devices, and computer networks, and other technology-based communication systems - research, predict, track and provide early warning of natural hazards.
• Disaster site communications maintain links with disaster response officials, the government, affected populations and sources of emergency relief supplies.
• Organisational communications are essential for the effective, dependable operation and interaction of private, governmental, and multinational disaster prevention and relief organisations.
• Communication for scientific development and policy formation between scientists, engineers, government officials, other disaster response officials, insurers, the media and the public, develop our knowledge of natural hazards and how to keep them from becoming disasters.
• Public education and communication – through electronic and print media, wired and cellular telephones, and alternative media – educate the public about natural hazards and disaster prevention, warn of approaching hazards, and facilitate participation in public discussions about disaster preparedness and response.

The role of communication technology has been recognised as integral to disaster management for a long time. Although application of communication technology has a role in all the four distinct phases of disaster management, namely, mitigation, preparedness, response and recovery, most of the application has traditionally been in the response and recovery phases. The new communication and information technologies that have emerged over the last two decades lend themselves to greater possibilities of integration of different communication systems. The interoperability of various communication systems including internet, mobile phones, fax, e-mail, radio and television is increasingly becoming functional. As a result, the possibilities for application of communication technologies in mitigation and prevention of disasters are also increasing. There are both social and technical aspects of the application of communication technologies in disaster management. However, the effective application of these technologies depends greatly upon their appropriateness for the social and economic context in which they are applied.

The Disaster Management Act, 2002 (Act No. 57 of 2002) that was promulgated on 15 January 2003 makes several references to the fact that the National Disaster Management Centre must act as a repository of, and conduit for, information concerning disasters and impending disasters and to take steps to disseminate such information, especially to communities that are vulnerable to disasters. Section 17 of the said Act specifically provides for the establishment of a Disaster Management Information System that should inter alia include early warning systems.

Developing institutional networks with clear responsibilities includes multi-disciplinary research, multi-sector policy and planning, multi-stakeholder participation and networking with relevant organisations, to name a few. The spectrum of collaborative processes and activities includes various ways of sharing information, joint research and integrated databases through to participatory strategic planning and programming.

The lack of clear and straightforward information, when confronted with the reality of a disaster, and a profusion of conflicting news or rumours, can confuse people and undermine their confidence in public officials. Clear and balanced information is critical, even when some level of uncertainty remains.

Despite preventative efforts at national and regional levels, the risk associated with natural disaster-related events has not decreased. Economic costs can be expected to increase, as economic assets accumulate and economic interdependence reaches new levels. Development and disaster-related policies have largely focused on emergency response, leaving a serious under investment in natural hazard prevention and mitigation. The increase in the frequency of disasters and their associated damages is part of a worldwide trend, which results from growing vulnerability and may reflect changing climate patterns.

Global risks seem to be increasing. An increasing number of planning agencies throughout the country are attempting to undertake natural hazard mitigation activities through development planning studies. However, while the expertise and baseline data in the form of maps, documents, and statistics may exist, a systematic approach is often lacking. The volume of information needed for natural hazards management, particularly in the context of integrated development planning, exceeds the capacity of manual methods and makes the use of computerised techniques compelling. Geographic information systems (GIS) can play a crucial role in this process, serving as a tool to collect, organise, analyse and present data.

It is clear that an effective information and communication system relies heavily on local community participation. Warnings for the Boxing Day Tsunami would have provided India and Sri Lanka with two hours warning time. It would have been a feat of emergency planning, resource logistics and public education to efficiently evacuate and provide shelter for the tens of thousands of people living along the coast who were at risk.

In conclusion, I would like to make use of this opportunity to once again thank the President of the South African Red Cross Society, Ms Mandisa Kalako-Williams for her willingness and support during South Africa’s coordinated response to the Asian Tsunami disaster. Without her expertise and knowledge of disaster relief our task would have been practically impossible to deal with the South African people’s overwhelming response.

Thank you.