Saturday, July 08, 2006
Editorial: Disaster-preparedness
DAVAO del Norte is prone to disasters particularly flooding, killer landslides, and other natural hazards not to mention certain man-made disasters like fire and armed conflicts that could result to mass destruction and displacement. This is the oft-repeated assessment of Carmelito Lupo, regional director of the Office of Civil Defense (OCD) in Region 11.
Lupo, OCD's top regional official, has included Davao City in his list of areas that are prone to floods and landslides, citing three big rivers as the possible source of onrushing waters either because of forest denudation and massive soil erosion.
Lupo made his latest assessment even as he called on community-based disaster management teams to prepare for the worst-case scenario, identifying major floods and landslides as the main hazards.
He warned disaster officials and residents of Davao del Norte to closely monitor four big rivers, Libuganon, Saug, Tuganay and Bincungan, as they have been identified as source of destructive flooding in the past.
Davao City has had its own share of big floods coming from the Talomo, Lipadas and Bankerohan rivers, Lupo added.
"These big rivers have become virtual catch basins of monsoon rains and heavy rainfall that could result into sudden and powerful gush of overflowing waters," he said.
Indeed, there is need for consistent preparedness especially among community-based disaster management groups.
In a scale of 1 to 10, the OCD Regional Director gave barangay residents a rating of "7" in terms of awareness.
Lupo has reason to be alarmed because a rating of "7" is definitely far from satisfactory.
"We have consistent education and information dissemination on disaster preparedness especially among barangay captains but we have not yet totally saturated the barangays," Lupo admitted.
This comes from Lupo himself. We have to take his assessment seriously and do something quick about it while there's still time.
Lupo should also look into the respective budgets of the region's local government units for disaster-preparedness and not allow the LGU officials to be nonchalant about this very important matter of survival.
For Bisaya stories from Davao. Click here. (July 8, 2006 issue)
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