[Urbanstudy] Workshop on Fundamentals of Reducing Risk and Managing Urban Disasters

[Bhargavi S.]

Environment
Support Group

invites
your participation in a workshop on

Fundamentals
of Reducing Risk and Managing Urban Disasters

A Workshop for Schools, Colleges,
Voluntary organizations, Hospitals, Resident Welfare Associations and Corporate
organisations

Saturday, 19th
November 2009, Time: 2.00 pm -6.00 pm

Venue:
Regional Institute of Cooperative Management, No.6, Padmanabhanagar,
Banashankari 2nd Stage, Bangalore 560070

Rapid urbanisation and unplanned growth is
increasing the risk of disasters in our cities. The competition for building
mega infrastructure, whether required or not, in a rush to showcase urban areas
raises serious questions about how secure these new projects are in meeting a
disaster event.  

As old neighbourhoods crumble under increased
pressure of land use and rise in population densities, the risk to lives and
livelihoods of residents has to be revisited. Poor solid waste management, poor
underground drainage, violation in building byelaws, lack of proper
implementation of the land use norms per the Town and Country Planning Act
standards, come together in creating high risk neighourhoods.  A lackadaisical attitude amongst regulatory
authorities has compounded the risk factors and turned our cities into high
impact disaster zones. 

Urban settlements are
prone to all sorts of disasters.  Frequently
occurring types are floods (Bangalore, despite having no major river within 100
kms.!, not to forget Mumbai), fire (Explosion of refineries in Jaipur and
Vizag), earthquakes (Ahmedabad), landslides (Guwahati), cyclones (Chennai),
heat and cold waves (Delhi) and a variety of human induced environmental
disasters (Plague in Surat).  In addition
the weighing down of land in urban areas through high rise constructions is
increasing seismic risk, while concretization of urban open spaces is reducing
ground water recharge, besides increasing flooding. In addition, climate change
induced impacts will increase the risk of disasters, especially in coastal
cities.  

Cities are clearly becoming
increasingly vulnerable to disasters, both natural and human induced.  Simply stated, we are not prepared to meet
such eventualities. This is in a period when we have moved into a demographic
profile where most humans on this planet live in cities. Not being prepared can
enhance risk.  This means increased loss
of life, property and an irreversible impact on society and our economy. Recovery
from such events takes a very long time, especially for resource deprived
societies such as ours.  Needless to
state the worst affected would be poor and depressed communities.   

There is hope
however, for the greatest potential in planning and responding to a disaster
exists amongst local communities. 
Disaster after disaster has proven that local communities respond first and
most effectively when disaster strikes. A recent example is how local residents
mobilized search operations to join fire forces in looking for two small
children who got washed into our drains due to totally avoidable urban flooding.  

How to Plan and Prevent Disasters is the first big step – and this is within
everyone’s reach.  All it requires is a
strong sense of community ownership and some smart thinking.  It is time we work together as a community to
identify risks around us, strategically prepare and plan actions to reduce the
impacts and come together in the eventuality of a disaster. 

This workshop will
help participants address risks related to urban flooding, fires, epidemics,
earthquakes and environmental disasters and will focus on how we can identify
risks, share creative methods to build local action networks, and work with
authorities in planning forward and responding to disasters. The workshop will include speakers from Fire
Forces, Public Health Practitioners with experience of work in disaster prone
areas, Lawyers, Police, Voluntary Organizations who have involved in relief and
rehabilitation in disaster zones and Urban Planners. 

Registration
fees Rs.150/- (To be paid by cash or Cheque drawn in favour of Environment
Support Group)

For registration and more details please contact
Bhargavi S. Rao, Coordinator (Education), Environment Support Group.

 Email: bhargavi at esgindia.org/esg at esgindia.org  Environment Support Group, 1572, Ring Road,
Banashankari 2nd stage, Bangalore 560070 Tel: 080-26713559-61 

Web: www.esgindia.org 


      
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/urbanstudygroup/attachments/20091202/5958ec2d/attachment-0001.html 
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: Workshop on Urban Disasters_Flyer.doc
Type: application/msword
Size: 72704 bytes
Desc: not available
Url : http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/urbanstudygroup/attachments/20091202/5958ec2d/attachment-0001.doc