The significance of drafting panchayat-level disaster management plan was stressed at a seminar here on Wednesday.
The programme was organised jointly by the Wayanad District Disaster Management Authority, Kerala Sasthra Sahithya Parishad, and the Hume Centre for Ecology.
Delivering the keynote address, S. Sreekumar, director, Integrated Rural Technology Centre, Palakkad, said that disaster management plans at grama panchayat-level were the need of the hour to mitigate the impact of natural disasters like floods and landslips.
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When the deluge had devastated the State last year, many people thought that it was once-in-a-lifetime experience. However, it was repeated this year, and nobody could predict when it would occur again. Though global warming and climate change are the triggering forces, human interventions like unscientific land use accelerate the disasters, Dr. Sreekumar said.
“The local administrative bodies have a significant role to play at the time of disaster, as they can act quickly. But, they are yet to be trained for the purpose,” Dr. Sreekumar said.
Every gram panchayat should draft its own disaster management plan and form volunteer teams to meet emergency situations. The local bodies should make budgetary allocation for the purpose, he said.
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Many landslips had occurred in various parts of the State but a majority of them were aborted ones. Now too many of the landslip-prone areas were in a “meta-stable condition”. The NCESS had identified the vulnerable areas in the State. The public should be made aware of the dos and don’ts in such areas, he said.
The State government had banned quarrying in high-hazardous zones to tackle landslips after the deluge last year. Such restrictions should be imposed in moderate-hazardous zones too, Dr. Sreekumar said.
Dr. Brijesh, Professor, Department of Geology, Ponnani, and C.K. Vishnudas, director, HCE, handled sessions related to the topic.