|
|
| français - Español |
|
 |
| Web Archives >
Programming >
Information (ICTs) >
Pan Asia Networking >
News >
|
ID: 106977Added: 2006-12-13 23:37Modified: 2006-12-14 0:17Refreshed: 2012-02-10 01:26 
|
|
News 7 of 50
Read about the project here: http://web.idrc.ca/ev_en.php?ID=93029_201&ID2=DO_TOPIC Story online at: http://www.wacc.org.uk/wacc/publications/media_development/2006_4/bridging_the_long_last_mile_in_sri_lanka While the countries of South and Southeast Asia were largely unprepared to act on the tsunami, it was not really a complete surprise. As the killer waves originating from the ocean near Indonesia’s Sumatra Island radiated across the Indian Ocean at the speed of a jetliner, the alert about the impending tsunami moved through the Internet at the speed of light. Scientists at the Pacific Tsunami Warning Centre (PTWC) in Hawaii, who had detected the extraordinary seismic activity, issued a local tsunami warning one hour and five minutes after the undersea quake. That was a bit too late for Indonesia – which, being closest to the quake’s epicentre, was already hit – but it could have made a difference in countries further away, such as India, Sri Lanka and Thailand. As is now well established, an authentic warning was delivered to each country, but there were few listeners at the receiving end – and even fewer to act on it. For example, the warning went unheeded by the centres of power in Sri Lanka: no one reacted with the swiftness such information warranted. Institutional, technological and societal failures combined to prevent the timely sharing of this warning within Sri Lanka. For example, the tsunami progressively pounded the tear drop-shaped island for nearly four hours – starting on the south-east coast from around 8.30 am local time. If only the rest of the island had been alerted soon after the east was first hit, coastal evacuation could have significantly reduced deaths elsewhere, which in the end came to nearly 40,000 (or 1 in 500 Sri Lankans).(1) But alas, that was not to be. No official telephone call or police emergency message travelled across the Ireland-sized island, much of whose interior was unaffected by the coastal disaster (A few private telephone calls helped save some lives). Elsewhere in tsunami-hit Asia, government officials chose to suppress the warning for various reasons. Thailand, for example, didn’t want a false alarm to affect its thriving tourist industry.(2) Where were all the ICTs?It was astonishing that a disaster of this magnitude could arrive in so many places in Asia without any public warning. The region has witnessed a rapid proliferation of information and communications technologies (ICTs) in recent years. Yet with thunderous impact, the tsunami drove home the point that the timely and efficient management of information mattered more than delivery technologies. As Arthur C Clarke, author and long time resident of Sri Lanka, remarked: ‘The Asian tsunami’s death toll could have been drastically reduced if the warning – already known to scientists – was disseminated quickly and effectively to millions of coastal dwellers on the Indian Ocean rim. It is appalling that our sophisticated global communications systems simply failed us that fateful day.’ Clarke, best known for inventing the communications satellite, added: ‘We need to address the long-term issues of better disaster preparedness, functional early warning systems and realistic arrangements to cope with tsunamis and a multitude of other hazards. It is imperative that we improve our monitoring and early warning systems, but we must also put in place a fail-proof plan to sound the alarm as and when necessary.’(3) In response to the Indian Ocean tsunami, the United Nations and aid donor countries initiated an inter-governmental process to build a high-tech tsunami early warning system in the Indian Ocean. By June 2006, UNESCO – whose Inter-governmental Oceanographic Commission coordinated the effort – reported that the system was ‘up and running’. Some 25 new seismographic stations would detect underwater earthquake tremors, while three deep-seabed sensors were in place to detect tsunami waves through tiny changes in water pressure. More equipment, including satellite sensors and additional seabed sensors, are to be added to the system in 2007 and 2008. A network of 26 national information centres will enable Indian Ocean countries to receive and distribute warnings of potential tsunamis, UNESCO added.(4) The Director General of UNESCO was quoted at the time as saying the system ‘needed to be tested in real situations’ and that its success depended on the open and free flow of data between nations. Java tsunami of July 2006Such a ‘test’ arrived sooner than many expected. On 17 July 2006, a 7.7 magnitude undersea earthquake occurred off the resort town of Pangandaran on Java island in Indonesia. The tremor was detected by various groups of seismologists overseas, and within 17 minutes, the PTWC issued a tsunami warning. That warning reached the Indonesian capital in two minutes by email, but officials there lacked a proper system to get the warning across to areas at risk in their vast, archipelagic nation. Two-metre high waves hit the southern Java coastline 37 minutes after the quake. A timely public warning could have saved many of the nearly 600 people who died.(5) UNESCO was quick to acknowledge ‘big gaps in getting the warnings to coastal communities in time’. Indonesian officials said there just wasn’t enough time to react to the warning. The Java tsunami further underlined a point we have been emphasising since the Indian Ocean tsunami: even the most sophisticated early warning system will be rendered ineffective without adequate mechanisms to disseminate warnings in a timely, credible manner. I had stressed this in an op-ed article written for the Science and Development Network in December 2005: ‘Developing effective early warning systems for multiple hazards is an urgent priority for the Indian Ocean rim countries. But setting up a state-of-the-art, high tech and high cost system is not a solution by itself. Because the most advanced early warning system in the world can only do half the job: alert governments and other centres of power (e.g. military) of an impending disaster. The far bigger challenge is to disseminate that warning to large numbers of people spread across vast areas in the shortest possible time.’(6) Then as now, the crucial question remains: how can we travel that all important ‘last mile’? As the residents of Java found out, that answer is not quite worked out yet. Obsession with gadgets still seems to dominate the discussion on delivering hazard warnings. This is what President Bill Clinton, UN Special Envoy for Tsunami Recovery, had cautioned against at the Third International Early Warning Conference in Bonn, in March 2006: ‘All the sophisticated technology won't matter if we don't reach real communities and people. Satellites, buoys, data networks will make us safer, but we must invest in the training, the institution building, the awareness raising on the ground.’(7) Going the last mile in Sri LankaPrecisely these elements form the cornerstone of an action research project currently underway in Sri Lanka. Its combination of community training, awareness raising and the use of appropriate ICTs offers a ‘real world test’ whose outcome would be of much interest across the developing world. The Last Mile Hazard Information Dissemination Project is a civil society and corporate partnership initiative to complement other action being taken at national and regional levels. It involves four Sri Lanka-based entities that value the role of information, communication and community mobilization in disaster preparedness:
The action research project aims to study, experiment and understand which ICTs and community mobilization methods will work most effectively in disseminating information on hazards faced by Sri Lanka coastal communities. The exercise is not confined to tsunamis alone; coastal erosion, cyclones, drought and floods are among the other hazards being covered. Focusing on the crucial ‘last mile’ dissemination, the project will:
In the first phase, the project involves 32 villages from eastern, western, northern and southern coastal areas of Sri Lanka – all impacted by the Indian Ocean tsunami. The project will evaluate the role played by several factors that contribute to the design of an effective last mile hazard information dissemination system, viz:
Different combinations of ICTs and community mobilization will be tested out in the participating villages. These are:
While some ICTs have been in public use for years or decades, others are recent innovations whose utility in disaster warning communication is being tested for the first time through this initiative. But all ICTs – old and new -- are only means to an end. Based on the project’s findings, we plan to identify the optimum combinations of training, community mobilization and technology tools that could help Sri Lankan communities to receive hazard warnings and disseminate them locally. Training youth leadersAmong the first and most important activities was training 30 youth leaders attached to Sarvodaya’s Shanti Sena (Peace Brigade) -- a volunteer youth force of over 100,000 dedicated to peace building and community development. The training, delivered by TVE Asia Pacific, covered topics such as understanding vulnerability and hazards; community-based hazard identification using Participatory Rural Appraisal (PRA) techniques; communicating risks and hazards; understanding and responding to early warnings; and community response planning.(14) Following their training in April 2006, the youth leaders returned to their areas to mobilize selected coastal villages. They facilitated each community to determine the most appropriate method/s for locally communicating a disaster warning they would receive through one of the five ICTs being tested in the project. By August 2006, different villages had opted for different dissemination methods: temple/church bells, sirens and fixed or mobile loud-speakers among others. But such a ‘last mile system’ will only be as good as the information and warnings it is fed with. Recognising this, Sarvodaya has set up a Hazard Information Hub (HIH) at its headquarters in Moratuwa, south of Colombo. The HIH will maintain close links with official disaster warning agencies of the government, as well as many international sources, on a round-the-clock basis. The project partners are well aware of the need to maintain credibility. ‘We will rely on designated governmental authorities to issue a specific warning on an impending disaster,” says Ravi Kandage, Coordinator of Sarvodaya Shanti Sena. “Our role is to seek, receive and amplify such warnings to the participating villages.’ In this, the project will work closely with the government’s own civilian and military personnel trained on disaster preparedness and management. In late 2006, after a few months of grassroots mobilisation, the project will evaluate the preparedness and the response capacity of trained communities. A carefully simulated disaster warning and evacuation drill will be carried out, which will also test the efficacy of different ICT tools deployed. As Sri Lanka’s largest development organization, working in over 15,000 villages, Sarvodaya has a long term interest in this project. It is hoped that this will lay the groundwork for giving all Sarvodaya villages the necessary skills and training to successfully handle warnings on a multitude of hazards. ‘One of the biggest lessons of the Tsunami was how lacking Sri Lanka was in terms of an emergency warning system,’ says Dr Vinya Ariyaratne, Executive Director of Sarvodaya. ‘This project seeks to prepare our villages from the ground-up to become disaster-resilient. When the official warnings come, we hope the villagers will be ready to act on them promptly.’ Managing risksDr Rohan Samarajiva, Executive Director, LIRNEasia, sees this project as a grassroots attempt to manage risks. ‘We don’t need to take unnecessary risks, but we also don’t have to run away from every risk,’ he says, pointing out that choices must be made based on best available information and calculated risks. In his view, Sri Lanka has experienced a multitude of natural disasters (mostly floods and cyclones) in recent years, but ‘we have passed up opportunities for effective preparedness. He also sees wider social benefits of any investments. ‘Early public warning protects the poor, given that the sectors of the economy most vulnerable to disaster are often the poorest. It is heartening that advanced hazard detection and monitoring systems are now being established across the Indian Ocean. What is now a priority is effective national action to establish last-mile warning systems, along with awareness and response programmes.’ Governments, civil society groups and mass media organisations in the Indian Ocean countries are now challenged to work out practical, reliable methods to broadcast disaster warnings to all communities at risk. The more redundancy and less bureaucracy we build into such systems, the greater our chances will be for actually saving lives with timely information. The Last Mile Hazard Information Dissemination Project can be a pathfinder for Asian countries that united in grief when the tsunami struck not too long ago. They can now unite again in ensuring public safety and community preparedness. Notes1. http://www.lirneasia.net/projects/completed-projects/national-early-warning-system/ Trained as a science writer, Nalaka Gunawardene worked in print and broadcast media before co-founding TVE Asia Pacific, www.tveap.org, in 1996. He currently heads the regional organisation specialising in communicating development through moving images, and is also on the Board of the Science and Development Network, www.scidev.net. The author thanks Rohan Samarajiva for review and comments on this article. http://www.wacc.org.uk/wacc/publications/media_development/2006_4/bridging_the_long_last_mile_in_sri_lanka Nalaka Gunawardene File : News_story.pdf
2006-10-01
News 7 of 50
|
|
||||||||||
|
|||||||||||||
| guest (Read)(Ottawa) Login | Home|Careers|Copyright and Terms of Use|General Infomation|Contact Us|Low bandwidth |
