New Delhi: A high level Indian delegation headed by the Union Minister of State for Home Affairs, Shri Kiren Rijiju is participating in the Asian Ministerial Conference of Disaster Risk Reduction (AMCDRR) being held at Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia from July 3-6, 2018.
While presenting the Country Statement today, Shri Kiren Rijiju briefed about the steps taken by India after the adoption of the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction (SFDRR). He said that in November, 2016 India hosted the 7th AMCDRR at New Delhi, where our Prime Minister outlined a 10-point agenda to provide a practical road map for the implementation of SFDRR in India and the region. He mentioned that within one year after the adoption of SFDRR, we launched our National Disaster Management Plan, fully aligned with the Sendai Framework.
Shri Rijiju highlighted the urgent need to ensure that the new infrastructure to be created anywhere should be resilient to disaster. In this context India organised a featured event during AMCDRR 2016 and also hosted an International Workshop on Disaster Resilient Infrastructure (DRI) in January this year, in which more than 21 nations participated. India will also be co-chairing a featured event on DRI on 5th July during this conference. As our earnest endeavour, India will work along with other nations and stakeholders to build partnerships and collaborate in the domain of resilient infrastructure.
The Minister outlined that India believes in working together with other nations in DRR as there are common challenges, benefits of sharing Best Practices and a need to respond together for Search and Rescue. Towards this end, India had organized a Joint Exercise of SAARC Nations in 2015, BIMSTEC Nations in 2017 and for SCO nations will organize another exercise in 2019.
Shri Rijiju shared the successful Indian experience in reducing the disaster mortality due to heat wave from over 2,000 in a year to less than 200. He also shared important flagship DRR schemes such as School Safety Programme in areas falling in Seismic Zone IV & V; National Cyclone Risk Mitigation Project in coastal states to reduce vulnerability of coastal communities to cyclones and drawing on the experience, we will soon be launching a comprehensive project on similar lines to address risks due to earthquakes.
The Minister highlighted the need to systemise disaster data by setting up a disaster database on a sustainable basis. Towards this end, we had recently organised a National Workshop to brainstorm various aspects and challenges that we are likely to encounter in setting up of a National Disaster Database. It will be our endeavour to set up Disaster Database expeditiously well before the target date of 2020.
While concluding, Shri Rijiju reaffirmed India’s commitment and support towards implementation of SFDRR and Asia Regional Plan. In this endeavour, he promised to look for opportunities to collaborate with countries, learn from their experiences and share what we have learnt on DRR. He also thanked the Government and people of Mongolia and UNISDR for organising this event and for excellent hospitality.
Meanwhile, Shri Rijiju held bilateral meetings on the sidelines of AMCDRR with Mongolia and Japan and also met representatives of civic societies from India who are attending AMCDRR. The Indian delegation, led by Shri Kiren Rijiju, had two separate meetings with the Deputy Prime Minister and Prime Minister of Mongolia. Mr. Ukhnaa Khurelsukh, Prime Minister of Mongolia, talked about their longstanding friendly relations with India and that after the visit of Indian Prime Minister, Shri Narendra Modi, in 2015, bilateral relations have got a boost. He also thanked India’s aid for setting up of Mongolia’s first domestic refinery, the foundation stone of which was laid by Union Home Minister Shri Rajnath Singh during his visit to Mongolia last week only.
India led a special session on Cultural Heritage and Disaster Risk Management (DRM) that brought together leading experts from India, Indonesia, Nepal, Japan, Turkey, Thailand and Myanmar to discuss challenges in protecting cultural heritage from disasters. The session also discussed cases of post-disaster recovery in heritage sector after major disaster events including Bam earthquake (Iran 2003), Yogyakarta earthquake (Indonesia 2006), Gorkha earthquake (Nepal 2015).
