Man-made and natural disasters have claimed thousands of lives in Pakistan. This is high time that the authorities concerned educate people to tackle such situations by involving modern techniques and scientific methods
World Civil Defence Day is celebrated on March 1 with objectives to establish a platform to build safer and more united communities within all nations. The day also provides an opportunity to pay tribute to those who died in the line of duty, and call upon all states to recognise them as role models for generations to come and to thank the countries that have successfully reinforced their capacity in all fields of civil protection, civil defence, and emergency services, and wish them to pursue our common endeavour.
The themes of this commemoration cover issues related to the safeguard of populations, property and environment as well as more specific topics such as education of children and women empowerment. The theme of the day for 2014 is Civil Defence and Culture of Prevention for Safer Society.
Pakistan is one of the countries which has diversity, not only of people, cultures, and traditions but also has a typical physiography. It has an unbelievable range of landscapes, mighty rivers, huge deserts, populous cities, fertile plains, thick forests and towering mountains.
In the last 65 years, Pakistan has witnessed several major natural and human-induced disasters such as domestic, industrial/commercial emergencies, terrorism, low and high scale internal conflicts, traffic accidents, environmental pollution, leakage of toxic gases and progressive environmental degradation.
Thousands of people have died with considerable loss of infrastructure. To fight such crisis and to protect both people and property we need to disseminate and implement preventive measures to exchange information and to use good planning, as well as to involve scientific institutions at the practical and theoretical levels.
Under these circumstances, we must have culture of civil defence based on prevention rather than response. Prevention programmes play a crucial role in saving peoples’ lives and preventing material losses by improving the capacity of national structures of civil protection, civil defence and emergency services.
However, prevention is not only a vital factor, but is also a complex task that requires adaptation to situation. It involves information to range of activities that may include deterrence operations, heightened inspections, improved surveillance and security operations, assessment and investigation to determine the nature and source of threats.
Prevention policies must take into account the regulations in all types of facilities such as the ongoing maintenance of fire-fighting and alarm systems, materials, devices and equipment of prevention, implementation of building codes, raising civil society awareness of health, safety and disaster prevention and risk reduction, as well as the constant control and supervision of workplaces involving oil, gas, chemicals, and other hazards. Public awareness and educational programmes should ensure that disaster-prone communities are kept aware of the risk and vulnerabilities.
In this way, communities are likely to support the need for sensible disaster prevention, if it becomes necessary. The programmes should incorporate preventive education for children. Training in higher secondary schools and universities can contribute to development of sense of prevention. Prevention programmes should focus on areas such as risk assessment through the adoption and development of national mechanisms and tools.
Pakistan has a national character portrayed by volunteerism, endowment and sacrifice. This special attribute needs to be capitalised in a skillful manner and relevant institutions should be strengthened to streamline the basic components into a disaster prevention and preparedness strategy.
