The Hindu Business Line : Remembering a tragedy

As 2006 winds to an end and merrymaking ushers in the holiday season of joy and conviviality, there are thousands of people around the world - many of them in Kerala - whose memories of the last month of the year are filled with fear and trepidation.

That is because two years ago, on December 26, 2004, an undersea earthquake occurred off the west coast of Sumatra, Indonesia, which triggered a series of devastating tsunamis that spread throughout the Indian Ocean region, killing large number of people and inundating coastal communities across South and South-East Asia, including parts of Indonesia, Sri Lanka, India, and Thailand.

The 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami — the largest earthquake in 40 years and the deadliest in history — resulted in an estimated worldwide death toll of over 2,75,000, with thousands of others missing, and more than 1.5 million people lost their homes and livelihoods, and losses were estimated at more than $7 billion.

Managing coastal areas

Two years on, have the affected regions learnt the lessons of the tragedy and are they managing their coastal areas and resources more rationally and scientifically? In the 18-km-long Alapad Island off Kollam in Kerala, for instance, the efforts of non-governmental and voluntary organisations and the State Government have resulted in a rehabilitation programme that provided houses for the tsunami victims.

However, most of the post-tsunami rehabilitation efforts have tended to focus on restoring shelters, rather than the long-term challenge of preparedness and conserving natural barriers. On the eve of the mega-disaster's second anniversary, an investigative new regional documentary from TVE Asia Pacific (TVEAP), titled "The Greenbelt Reports: Armed by Nature", investigates challenges in conserving Asia's coastal greenbelts - coral reefs, mangroves and sand dunes - that offer protection from sea-based disasters, as well as many economic benefits to coastal communities.

Conservation of nature

According to a release from TVEAP, the documentary was filmed over several months in 2006 in many coastal locations of India, Indonesia, Sri Lanka and Thailand - the four countries that were the hardest hit by the Asian tsunami. Soon after the disaster, local people, divers and researchers in different parts of Asia noticed something unusual: coastal locations with mangrove forests, sand dunes or coral reefs had suffered considerably less damage. Evidently, these natural formations had acted as a protective barrier against wave action, a phenomenon now called the `greenbelt effect'.

In a recent report, the United Nation's special envoy for the tsunami disaster, the former US President, Mr Bill Clinton, identifies the following 10 key lessons learned from the recovery effort:

Key lessons

Governments, donor and aid agencies must recognise that families and communities drive their own recovery.

Recovery "must promote fairness and equity''.

Governments must be better prepared for future disasters.

Local governments must be empowered to manage recovery efforts, and donors must devote greater resources to strengthening the government recovery institutions.

Good information is key to recovery planning and effective coordination.

The UN, World Bank and other multilateral agencies must "clarify their roles and relationships".

The expanding role of relief agencies must be accompanied by increased quality of recovery efforts.

Governments and aid agencies must encourage entrepreneurs to flourish.

Agency partnerships must efficiently deliver to those in need without "rivalry and unhealthy competition".

Good recovery must reduce risks and build resilience in communities.

These are some of the prescriptions that Kerala could well follow not just in its post-disaster rehabilitation and reconstruction efforts but also in its larger social and economic development programmes. As the images of the December 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami struggle to fade from memory, the lessons learnt could well prove to be a saving grace.

The writer can be contacted at kgkumar@gmail.com

More Stories on : Natural Calamities | Kerala | Random Walk

Article E-Mail :: Comment :: Syndication :: Printer Friendly Page