National Academy in India Takes an Important Step Forward

The National Academy of Agricultural Sciences of India recently organised a special technical session in the Seventh National Agricultural Sciences Congress (16-18 Feb; Poona; India) on "Science and Tsunami". That was quite a move forward for the Academy! A number of top scientits of India connected with oceanography, geology, remote sensing and plantation crops as well as fisheries made very good presentations. The origin/cause of Tsunami was well explained. The damage assessment was rigorous. A lot of progress in infusing science in disaster management, I must say. The Academy council did a very good job putting this together.
The preparedness part was however treated as a component of the prediction system, which I thought was a bit of a let down. Academics are yet to realise that expesnive systems for prediction have not proved useful if not linked with community-managed/owned channels of communication. There is a good move forward, and there is scope for moving further on.

community-managed EWS

Further on preparedness: the local or the community-ownership is at the heart of any system or arrangement to foster disaster preparedness. Science-derived alerts have greater impact if they can be delivered to community-owned and managed channels of communication.

There was a great cyclone that attacked the coast of Orissa in India on the 29th Oct 1999. This was one of the worst disasters in recent Indian history, claiming a toll of nearly 20000 human lives besides extensive property damage. I learnt subsequently that the district administration had indeed installed sirens in many coastal villages that would go off when a cyclonic storm approached the shore (activiated from the district collectorate). However, the equipment was in a state of repair and the administration of the area was not aware of this status.

In the Tsunami attack on the Pondicherry coast, the local public announcement arrangement was found useful in saving hundreds of lives. The arrangement had been set up at the request of the local community, and had been maintained by them to issue alerts on bad weather to the fisher families. They had found it useful on many an occasion.

Any Early Warning System (EWS) should integrate the top-down flow of science-based alert information with the community-owned and managed channels of communication. In a crisis, one without the other is not likely to render help to the vulnerable families.