Disaster Preparedness

Review June-November 2004

Commitment to the reduction of disasters has been growing worldwide, although actual materialization is still slow. Human and economic losses due to natural disasters continue to rise and remain as a major obstacle to sustainable development. Natural disasters killed 76,806 people in 2003, three times the number of victims in 2002, a rise due in part to extremes in the global climate (an earthquake that killed 31,000 people in the Iranian city of Bam and a heat wave in Europe that killed 35,000 - source International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies IFRC, World Disaster Report 2004)

Disaster reduction policies and measures need to be implemented to build disaster resilient societies and communities to reduce the level of risk while ensuring, on the other hand, that development efforts do not increase the vulnerability to hazards. While governments bear the primary responsibility with regard to the right to safety and security, they cannot and should not shoulder these tasks alone. At national and international levels, civil society is playing an ever more active role in forming policies to address risk. The private sector also has a role to play in moving towards sustainable development that incorporates an awareness of disaster risk — a role that could be enhanced.

The DPPI has developed over the past 3 years into an effective consultative and coordinative mechanism. It fosters cooperation and coordination across borders in order to ensure the safety for citizens as well as the environment. The DPPI is regionally owned and enjoys strong support from the international community. For this reason also, DPPI is an instrument in the overall Stability Pact objective of regional cooperation.

Progress report:

In the period from the last RT and WTIII Meeting (in June 2004), the second Regional DPPI Meeting took place in Skopje, from 13-15 October. The DPPI partners reviewed past activities and agreed on the way forward. Reports (minutes) are available on the DPPI web page (www.dppi.info). It is important to notice, that regional meetings are a functional tool for project ideas (proposed by the regional countries), evaluation, exchange of information aimed to streamline and rationalize projects and activities and the best platform for lessons learnt and exchange of experiences in Euro-Atlantic integration processes.

Several meetings of the DPPI Working Groups (along the project facilitation and implementation) took place.

In 2004 DPPI major donors met several times, dealing mainly with budgetary and organizational issues. Norway, Switzerland and United States of America pledged funding for 2005.

Regional project facilitation and implementation: results and challenges
Related activities are aimed to support SEE countries to prepare feasible project proposals and to strengthen regional cooperation by providing a coordinative platform and international methodology in use. It resulted in several regionally owned project proposals, some of them to be further developed. Just to list few:

Excellent collaboration was achieved with NATO Science for Peace (SfP) Programme, which is supporting the process by providing financial support and expert guidance to selected DPPI projects (Seismological zoning, led by Moldova, for Bulgaria, Moldova and Romania. NATO SfP also clearly expressed a readiness to co-finance the implementation of it jointly with SP and the DPPI donors

Project Earthquake Monitoring in Support of Disaster Preparedness in SEE, coordinated by European Mediterranean Seismological Centre (EMSC),

ORFEUS and DPPI is an example of a regionally owned project, with strong commitment from the SEE countries. This guarantees sustainability of the project after implementation. At the same time, it got broad support from the European and World seismological community. The biggest challenge is to find sufficient funds for implementation

The Romanian project’s PREMIAN main objective is to develop a compatible regional information system for industrial and technological hazards (pollutant sources), identified in EC SEVESO II Directive. This system would support national authorities in risk management and emergencies.

Successful implementation of JFFU Project was presented earlier. Countries are keen to expand the project to other regions.

Implementation of the Disaster Management Training Project (11 training events conducted in SEE in 2004) is a real capacity building and an instrument to strengthen network in the region at all levels.

Networking of the DPPI partners
Increased cooperation and coordination with International Federation for Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies IFRC, UNDP, NATO, Swedish Search and Rescue Services Agency, RACVIAC, Civil Military Emergency Planning Council for SEE (CMEPC), East-West Institute, Central European Initiative, HELP Germany and others has been achieved and proved instrumental for achieved results.

That broad cooperation also influenced and increased the visibility of the Stability Pact and the DPPI.

WORK PLAN 2005

Project facilitation and implementation, launched in the DPPI framework is the basis of immediate and future work:

• Disaster Management Training Project (2002 – 2005) implementation
• Joint Fire Fighting Unit Project, to monitor the sustainability of the project, further development and to use the lessons learnt to foster bilateral and multilateral agreements to lead towards regional agreement
• Seismological Project, to continue supporting activities aimed to get this project funded via EU funds
• Project Hydro-meteorological network for SEE, to re-evaluate interest for this project
• Project Seismological Zoning, will start with implementation in 2004, to secure missing funds through SP donors
• Project PREMIAN (Romania, in context of EC SEVESO II Dir)
• Hungarian project Flood Management to be further elaborated in close cooperation with IFRC
• Capacity building for project facilitation and management shall be more emphasized and more funds allocated for it

Key events:

• May and October the DPPI Advisory Board Meeting (Brussels)
• April (in BIH, tbc) and September, Regional DPPI Meeting
• WG Meetings related to projects facilitation (pending on actual need)

Instead of conclusions, future challenges
It was stressed several times that urging countries to establish agreements, rules and regulations for border crossing to ensure rapid disaster/humanitarian response and assistance, remains a priority and a challenge for the DPPI. The importance of the issue was also highlighted in the recent report from the informal meeting of the EU Ministers of Justice and Home Affairs (JHA Council) in Scheveningen, 1.10.2004.

Prepared by:
Cvetka Krajic Tomin
Executive Secretary DPPI