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DISASTER-WISE KIDS

30 Aug 2006
Source: AlertNet

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Dutch swimmer Marleen Veldhuis competes in European Aquatic Championships in Budapest, August 2006. Disasters experts say something as simple as teaching children to swim can save lives.
REUTERS/Wolfgang Rattay

Background

• Haiti troubles

• Indian Ocean tsunami

• Indonesia earthquake

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As disasters experts meet in Davos, Switzerland this week, here's a round-up of some of the simple things even the poorest countries can do to avoid massive death tolls.

Flood-proof schools in Bangladesh

In the last 10 years disasters have claimed over 600,000 lives worldwide, affected over 2 billion people and set back development in some countries by decades.

Bangladesh is a country that's proof you don't need to invest billions in high-tech gadgetry to save lives.

All schools built since 2004 have been designed to double up as flood shelters. New schools are built from reinforced concrete and raised off the ground.

While a devastating cyclone in 1991 killed some 138,000 people in a single night, the number of deaths in recent cyclones has been in the low hundreds, and that's partly down to the grassroots work they've done. The country now has some 3,000 cyclone shelters in coastal areas and off shore islands and around 30,000 trained volunteers.

Text messages in China

As China's strongest typhoon in 50 years barrelled towards the southeast coast in early August the authorities evacuated more than 1 million people from its path. A similar-sized evacuation, the equivalent of clearing out a city like Detroit, was carried out in May as Typhoon Chanchu slammed into the country.

Ahead of Super Typhoon Saomai's arrival this month, officials blitzed residents with text message warnings along with storm updates broadcast over the television and Internet. China has used text messaging to alert millions of people to several typhoons in the last year.

Sri Lanka has also been trying to harness the mobile phone as a powerful warning device, and is working on a text message alert system to give people a crucial few minutes to seek safety if another tsunami hits.

Pearl-diving in Philippines

Giant waves pounding the southern Philippines swept four coastal villages out to sea in early August, leaving thousands homeless after destroying their stilt houses.

But the disaster could have been far worse. Many people survived because they belonged to the Badjao tribe, strong swimmers famed for their skill in diving for pearls.

Many Sri Lankan women who died in the tsunami perished simply because girls, unlike boys, were not traditionally taught how to swim. Several groups have now started swimming classes for women.

Dollar a child in Pakistan

Some 16,000 children were crushed to death in their classrooms in last year's Pakistan earthquake - around a fifth of the total death toll. Yet it could have cost as little as a dollar a child to make schools strong enough to withstand quakes, according to one aid agency.

The United Nations launched a two-year programme this summer to "disaster proof" schools and push governments to make lessons on natural hazards and how to reduce deaths and injury part of the curriculum. Aid agency ActionAid is launching a similar project in countries including Malawi, Ghana, Kenya, Haiti and Bangladesh.

Indian quake-proof schools

Many of the children who died in the devastating 2001 earthquake in the eastern Indian state of Gujarat were also killed when their classrooms collapsed on top of them. A safety initiative launched after the quake is making school buildings stronger and teaching children, teachers and parents what to do in an emergency.

Indian aid agency SEEDS says it costs about $7,200 to build a quake- and cyclone-resistant primary school if it's a small one of 1000 square feet (304.8 square metres). That's compared to $6,650 to build the same school without the special features. Retrofitting such a building, if it's in poor condition, costs about $1,100, which is 15 percent of the total cost of the building. Retrofitting a similar school in reasonable condition costs $679 (10 percent).

Cuba, Nepal and Turkey are also retrofitting schools, hospitals and public buildings with a view to saving lives and ensuring critical services can keep going in the event of a disaster.

Cuban textbooks

Cuba, which evacuated 600,000 people this week from the path of Hurricane Ernesto, has seen a marked reduction in the loss of life during the annual hurricane season since making disaster prevention and preparedness part of the curriculum.

The 2004 hurricane season, one of the worst in decades, killed 2,000 people. Most of the deaths were in Haiti, wracked by poverty and political violence. In Cuba, which conducts regular evacuation drills and education campaigns, just four people died.

Only 33 out of 82 nations have disaster related subjects in their national school curricula, according to a report for the U.N.'s International Strategy for Disaster Reduction (ISDR).

In China, which is hammered by typhoons and prone to earthquakes, a textbook on disaster risk reduction is made available for all students. Turkey also has a countrywide disaster awareness training programme for its 5 million children.

Indonesia sea knowledge

But education shouldn't be confined to the classroom. When the Indian Ocean tsunami crashed into the Indonesian island of Simeulue almost all 80,000 inhabitants survived because knowledge about the behaviour of the sea before a tsunami had been handed down the generations.

The 2004 tragedy killed seven people in Simeulue. Just across the water in nearby Aceh province 170,000 died or are missing presumed dead.

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Last updated:Fri Jan 5 23:35:11 2007