Clinton at the third Early Warning Conference. REUTERS/Alex Grimm
Former U.S. President Bill Clinton has urged the world to invest more in early warning systems to prevent the scale of death and destruction seen in the tsunami and other natural disasters. Here are highlights from the speech he gave to the Third International Early Warning Conference in Bonn in his capacity as the U.N. Special Envoy for Tsunami Recovery.The Indian Ocean tsunami ... was the loudest wake-up call of many about the need to reduce risk and improve management of natural hazards.
... the U.N. mission has been to build back better, to ensure that these recovery efforts do not simply restore communities to their pre-tsunami vulnerability, but instead leave the survivors of the disaster safer than before, including with effective early warning systems. We owe it to them and the memories of their loved ones to deliver on that promise.
Of course, we gather here because making communities safer is a global priority that goes far beyond the tsunami&${esc.hash}39;s reach. From Sri Lanka to Haiti, to Turkey, to recent events in Mississippi and Louisiana in the United States, we have seen years of development wiped out in a matter of moments or days. These have taken a heavy social and economic toll and will continue to do so. The total number of people affected each year by natural disasters vastly increased in the last decade. ...
Last year ... 97,000 people lost their lives in nearly 150 disasters, the largest number of deaths of course coming in Kashmir. In 1998, disasters caused 65.5 billion dollars in economic losses worldwide. In 2004, because of the tsunami, hurricane Ivan and other disasters, losses were about 120 billion. In 2005, losses were 220 billion.
People in the insurance industry tell me that aggregate losses in the last ten years were three times greater than in any previous decade on record. From Aceh to New Orleans to Kashmir, unfortunately, the main victims of disasters don&${esc.hash}39;t have insurance. They are the poor and the vulnerable and often those with the least political influence to get the changes needed that guarantee them and their families a decent life. ...
Why are there more disasters with greater economic and social cost? I think part of the aggregate cost is simply a function of growing population. We now have 6.5 billion people in the world. We are likely to have 9 billion by 2050. Almost without exception, the population growth is occurring in the poorest countries where they will be least able to do what you are here recommending that we all do. ...
The rich countries will pay sooner or later if we let the disasters occur, (they) will just wind up spending more money. But we have a very bad habit of ignoring the problems of our poorer brothers and sisters until they are too grave, too painful and, alas, too expensive to ignore. ...
The second major factor is rapid urbanization, more people living in concentrated areas. More often than not, driven by poverty, these populations mostly settle into the more hazard-prone areas: flood planes, coastal areas, unstable hillside slopes or near active volcanoes.
Third, their and our economic activities take a toll on natural defenses against hazards. Witness the lesser impact of the tsunami in places where the coral reefs or the mangrove trees remain intact. The recent landslides in the Philippines occurred often on totally deforested slopes. Sus-tainable development, therefore, is imperative for human and economic as well as environmental reasons.
Fourth, our economic behavior is plainly affecting the climate. Nearly 90 percent of all natural hazards are climate or weather-related. And these extreme weather events are increasing in their number and intensity. Last year was a record hurricane season, reflected in part where the hurri-canes so severely battered the Gulf Coast or the United States, Katrina and Rita. ...
The planet is warming faster than most experts thought even as recently as two years ago. The ice is melting more quickly, not simply on the North Pole and the South Pole, but &${esc.hash}39; particularly troubling for those of us in the northern half of the planet &${esc.hash}39; on Greenland ... if the Greenland icecap melts in total, it could raise the level of the North Atlantic by about 40 feet. And at predicted levels, it&${esc.hash}39;s going to raise the level of the North Atlantic enough to cause calamitous damage some time in the next 30 to 40 years. ...
We know that continued climate change will force almost all agricultural production north if you are in the northern hemisphere, or south if you are in the southern hemisphere which could create tens of millions of food refugees in the next few decades.
Finally, it is nearly a certainty that by 2050, unless we do something to reverse this trend, we will have the loss of many, many cities along the coastal planes and whole island nations.
Indeed, I often think about one of the nations that I have worked hard to help in the tsunami, the Maldives, a small country with only 130,000 people for which I have developed a great affection. My successor in interest at some future point will not have to worry about them anymore; we will just take a bunch of boats and take them away as their little nation vanishes under the water.
...if you want a disaster prevention system that works, we have to address this. We have to do more to address the underlying causes of vulnerability. ...
We know that urbanization, if managed properly, needs not increase risks, but there must be building codes and there can be building codes and standards even in poor countries that save lives.
We know that if the mangrove trees had not been torn down anywhere where they previously stood in the tsunami-affected countries, the losses would have been substantially smaller in those places.
In the Kashmir earthquake last October, schools crumbled, crushing to death 18,000 students and nearly a thousand teachers. Even though it&${esc.hash}39;s a poor area, they could have had simple basic building standards which would have saved lives. I saw the same thing in 2001 in India, in Gujarat, where the earthquake did so much damage to hundreds of villages as well as the largest cities in the province.
When hurricane Luis hit Saint Martin in 1995, with stricter building codes on the French side of the island, the buildings there were far less damaged than those on the Dutch side, even though the center of the storm was closer to the French side. ...
Micro insurance should be vastly expanded so that poor people around the world can transfer risk and recover more quickly. Only one percent of the households and businesses in low-income countries have any kind of catastrophic insurance coverage, compared with 30 percent in high-income countries.
We know that education and awareness can play a vital role and sometimes traditional knowledge is as good as science. When the tsunami hit Simeulue Island of Aceh, people rushed to the highlands. Only seven people out of the total population of 80,000 died. Early in the last century, Simeulue suffered a tsunami and through an oral history, generations of island residents had been educated about changes in the oceans just before a tsunami strikes. That lore saved many thousands of lives. ...
Early warning systems are the key to effective risk reduction. They do save lives and livelihoods. And, as I said, in the world we live in, with so much division between rich and poor, they also save an enormous amount of investment for the donor countries who will be called upon to help when people die from such disasters.
Bangladesh learned about the value of these things in 1970 when a cyclone resulted in more than 300,000 deaths. The government and people subsequently put in place effective early warning and preparedness measures involving modern cyclone-forecasting systems and more than 5,000 people to get the message to the villages.
When a cyclone of similar force struck in 1997, 200 people were killed, which brings up to mind a point I want to make. The interesting thing to me is what Bangladesh did to marry old-fashioned communication with modern technology, the so-called &${esc.hash}39;last mile&${esc.hash}39; of the early warning system. It&${esc.hash}39;s something that we dare not forget in our UN work for the tsunami...
All the sophisticated technology won&${esc.hash}39;t matter if we don&${esc.hash}39;t reach real communities and people. Satellites, buoys, data networks will make us safer, but we must invest in the training, the institution building, the awareness raising on the ground. ...
About 100,000 new homes have been built or are under construction today across the tsunami-affected region. Thousands more are in the pipeline. Some 400 permanent schools are under construction and with the work on temporary facilities, children went back to school more quickly than I thought they would. Tourist numbers are on the rebound in Thailand, in the Maldives.
In Sri Lanka, over 70 percent of households are reported to have regained a steady income. I am still frustrated that close to 50,000 people remain in tents in Aceh, but I am pleased that the temporary shelter construction has been moving much more rapidly. ...
The last time I went to Aceh, I went to one of the camps for the internally displaced where there were thousands of people living ... I was greeted by the elected leader of the community, a fellow just like everybody else living in the camp, and his wife and his son.
This little boy of theirs, nine years old, was the most beautiful child I have ever seen. It was shocking; I could hardly get my breath when I looked at him: luminous eyes, bright smile. So I said to my young interpreter: I believe that&${esc.hash}39;s the best-looking boy I ever saw in my life. She said: "Yes, he is a beautiful boy. And before the tsunami, he had nine brothers and sisters. Now they are all gone." ...
The last stop I made in this little tent city was the Maternal and Child Health Clinic and as I was about to leave, the mother of this little boy who had lost nine of her own children came up to me holding a baby.
She informed me that this baby was the youngest baby in the camp &${esc.hash}39; it was two days old &${esc.hash}39; and that she was bringing it to me because in their culture ... a woman does not get out of bed for 40 days after she gives birth.
So this woman who has lost nine of her own children is holding this baby and says: "We want you to name this child." So I looked at her and I said: "What is the word in your language for &${esc.hash}39;new beginning&${esc.hash}39;?" And she said: "Well, lucky for you, in our language the word &${esc.hash}39;dawn&${esc.hash}39;, which is a girl&${esc.hash}39;s name in English, is a boy&${esc.hash}39;s name. So we will call this boy Dawn. And whenever we see him, we will think of a new beginning."
I could not imagine the courage of that mother having lost nine of her own children, holding that baby and smiling and talking about new beginnings. So think about them when you make these recommendations and when we see them through.
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