Disaster Management in Pakistan

Dr. Muhammad Asim

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• Pakistan is vulnerable to disaster risks from a
range of hazards including cyclones/storms,
droughts, earthquakes, epidemics, floods, glacial
lake outbursts, landslides, pest attacks, river
erosion and tsunami. Also Human induced hazards
like oil spills, urban and forest fires etc. In terms of
their frequency and scale of impact are:-
earthquakes, droughts, flooding, Wind Storms and
Landslides that have caused widespread damages
and losses in the past .

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• These potential hazards risk makes the Pakistan’s
population vulnerable and thus it arise the need for
the government to be prepared against these
disasters. Though the preparedness against these
disasters is the task of masses as well but since the
government has the mandate of the people
therefore it becomes the prime responsibility to take
the step for safer communities.

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Disaster history is long in Pakistan since it came into
being in 1947. Rivers those make land fertile also
increase vulnerability of the people in terms of floods.
Mountainous areas those are tourist attraction place
also vulnerable to landslide and earthquake.

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Though there is no such definition which defines the
disaster through its impact or intensity by causalities or
damages at government level, but the disaster is
defined academically as an incident in which
community seeks assistance from external sources to
come out from such event.

Thus, the big losses can be defined as disasters when

national government has to intervene and other
external support agencies come to help the community
like United Nations and International Nongovernment
Organizations (NGOs) etc. 6
 Natural
Disasters
History
# of
events
of
Killed Disaster
Injured Home- in
less
Pakistan
Affected Total
Affected
Damage
in US
$(000’s)
Earthquake 22 142,800 18,854 53,585 380,237 452,676 19,255
Wind storm 22 11,662 1,183 22,797 1,057,000 1,080,980 4,100
Flood 45 11,640 1,242 8,923,9 38,032,50 46,957,73 2,746,03
85 5 2 0
Extreme 13 1,216 24 0 250 274 0
Tempera-
ture
Slides 11 360 114 3,100 200 3,414 0
Epidemic 8 241 100 0 25,275 25,375 0
Drought 4 223 0 0 2,269,300 2,269,300 247,000
0
Famine 1 0 0 0 300,000 300,000 0
Insect 1 0 0 0 0 0 0
Infestation 7
Disaster Management History in Pakistan
can be divided into two Eras.

- Before 2005

- After 2005

These two eras can also be classified as the

legislation for disaster management i.e. 1958
Act and 2006. The main incident was the 2005
Kashmir earthquake which change the paradigm
for the disaster management in Pakistan
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Pakistan came into being in 1947 and at that time the
structure of government and civil services was at very
initial stages.

Most of the laws were just adopted from the British

law because Britain was the ruler before independence.

First constitution of Pakistan was in 1956 which

provided the basis of government business and
parliamentarian system. Thus, the Calamity Act of 1958
can be considered a beginning effort to deal disasters
impact.
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The Act of 1958 provided the powers and mechanism
for maintenance and restoration of affected area by
calamities, prevention and control of relief against such
calamities.

This ordinance declared the provinces should

respond against any impact of disaster. Thus, this
Act mandated provinces to appoint the Provincial
Relief Commissioner (PRC) and a certain powers
were delegated to PRC i.e. evacuation or
segregation of population, requisition of instruments
for rescue and transportation etc.
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The reactive approach of the Relief commissioners and cells
make the system ineffective and it failed to cope with incident of
2005.

The main reason of the failure of this system was the

drawbacks in establishing of appropriate policy, institutional and
legal arrangements to deal with issues of risk and vulnerability
which was not given priority at higher levels.

There was a lack of political will and capacities for risk analysis
and risk reduction. Lack of disaster risk management plans also
remains a major issue. Even the districts and regions that have
suffered from frequent hazards did not have plans, except a few.
 2005 earthquake where bring lot of destruction but also led to the new
legislation which instructed to establish institution for the disaster
management.

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The NDMC which falls under
the Prime Minister’s secretariat,
is the highest decision making
body for integration of disaster
risk reduction and management
into main stream development.
NDMA (authority) has been
established as the coordinating
body for cross-sectoral disaster
management programmes.
The ordinance also directed provinces to constitute the
Provincial Disaster Management Councils (PDMCs) and
Provincial Disaster Management Authority (PDMA).
PMDC chairman would be Chief Minister (chief
executive of Province) the same with the NDMC.

Further, ordinance directed to constitute the authorities

at the District level (Local government Unit) and members
will be District Nazim (elected head of district), District
Coordination Officer and other line agencies.

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• The National and Provincial councils are the decision making
bodies while the authorities are the implementing and
coordinating arms. NDMC role is to approve plans prepared
by the Ministries or Divisions, compile policies on disaster risk
management, lay down guidelines for national and provincial
authorities, Provide support to other countries affected by
major disaster identified by national government. In the same
way, the PDMCs perform the functions more or less the same
as NDMC but the functions of NDMC are at national level
while the policies of PDMCs are of provincial level e.g. if a big
flood or cyclone that may affect two or three provinces then
NDMC has to play a role in the mitigation and coordination
among provinces and relief activities.
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 Structure for Disaster Management
National Disaster Management Commission (NDMC)

National Disaster Provincial/ Regional

Management Authority Disaster Management
(NDMA) Commissions (PDMCs)

Donors, UN, PDMA SDMJA

N.W.F.P AMMU
AND
KASHMIR
NGOs, Media Provincial/ Regional
Disaster Management
Federal Ministries, Authority (PDMA)
Departments,
Technical PDM A
PUNJAB
Agencies Media, Banks,
Insurance, BALOCHISTAN
Private Sector
District/ Municipal PDMA
Technical Institutions Disaster Management PDSM AH
IND
of the Federal Authority
Government

Tehsil Structures

Community Based
Organizations (CBOs),
Citizen Community Union Councils
Boards (CCBs)
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 Federalism Approach

When the 2005 earthquake struck Pakistan did not have a central
disaster management body. As it soon became apparent when
Pakistan had been hit by a massive natural disaster, which would
require coordinated efforts by Government, civil society and the
international community, one of the first steps the Government
took was to create an agency to manage this.
The Federal Relief Commission (FRC) was formed on 10 October
2005. (Earthquake 8/10, NDMA 2007) Previously Emergency Relief
Cell was utilized to provide the assistance to the affected
community at federal and provincial level. The massive
destruction at this level forced the government to adopt the
central command system for the relief activities in 2005.

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Establishing NDMA was a good step towards the
coping of disaster impacts but the efforts in
implementing system at provincial level and further
to local government units need to be strengthened.
Disaster impact is huge and time delays in
coordination due to mandates of agencies needs to
be minimized.

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• Elements those need to be managed are:-
1. Institutional Arrangement
2. National Hazard and Vulnerability Analysis
3. Training, Education and Awareness
4. Promoting Disaster Risk Management Planning
5. Community and Local Level Risk Reduction Programming
6. Multi-hazard Early Warning System
7. Mainstreaming Disaster Risk Reduction into Development
Planning
8. Emergency Response System
Institutional arrangements are the policies, systems, and processes that organizations use to legislate, plan and manage their
activities efficiently and to effectively coordinate with others in order to fulfill their mandate 18
Key Issues:

A system of DM Commission and authorities

proposed in the NDM Ordinance 2006. It could be
difficult to maintain the committees at higher level
as disaster is issue of local level thus the local
authorities capacity building should be enhanced in
case of disaster occurrence.

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Strategy:

Appropriate systems, procedures and plans would be

developed to facilitate effective working of the NDMA.
Subsequently the formation of provincial / regional
Commissions and Authorities will be encouraged in
four provinces, the AJK and FATA. Efforts will be
particularly undertaken to form DM Authorities in
prioritized hazard prone districts, municipalities and
cantonments.

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 National Hazard and Vulnerability Analysis
(2)
Key Issues:

• No systematic information exists in Pakistan about

relative vulnerability of various local areas to
prevent hazards. In the absence of such
information it is difficult to identify priorities and
make decisions on allocation of resources for risk
reduction.
• Risks and vulnerabilities are dynamic and they
change overtime and space.

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 National Hazard and Vulnerability Analysis
(2)
Strategy:
• A Vulnerability Atlas of Pakistan need to be
prepared. This would include hazard maps
indicating the location of various hazards with
zonation of risk levels; e.g. low, moderate and
severe.
• The Vulnerability analysis will identify key
infrastructure and environmental resources in
each local area that are prone to damage and loss
from prevalent hazards.
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 Training, Education and Awareness (3)

Key Issues:

• DRM education, training and awareness is

required in multiple sectors; e.g. civil servants,
development ministries at provincial and national
levels, staff of district, provincial and national DM
authorities, staff of technical agencies.
• Enhancement of knowledge and skills of students
would also be pertinent in order to enable future
generations to deal with disaster risk problems.

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 Training, Education and Awareness (3)

Key Issues:

• Specialized training in areas of response would also

be needed; e.g. search and rescue, first aid, fire
fighting, evacuation, camp management and relief
distribution.

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 Training, Education and Awareness (3)

Strategy:

• Organize media orientations about its role in

promoting disaster risk management and
community preparedness.
• Work with the Ministry of Education to integrate
disaster risk management component in school,
college and university syllabus.

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 Promoting Disaster Risk Management
Planning (4)
Key Issues:
• Establishment of policies, standards, organizational
arrangements and operational plans to be executed
following a disaster is crucial. Effective plans
consider securing resources; e.g. stockpiling
supplies and particular funds.
• It is important to clearly define roles of
stakeholders and to strengthen coordination
amongst concerned agencies.

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 Promoting Disaster Risk Management
Planning (4)
Strategy:
• NDMA will take the lead in formulating National
Disaster Response Plan. The plan will define roles
and responsibilities of federal ministries,
departments and other entities with regards to
national level disaster response.
• NDMA will also work with selected federal
ministries to support them in development of
sectoral disaster risk management plans.

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 Community and Local Level Risk
Reduction Programming (5)
Key Issues:
• The local communities, local infrastructure and local
economy are directly affected by disasters and
women, children and elderly are usually affected.
• At the same time local communities and authorities
are first responders to any disaster situation. The
utilization of resources and energies at this level will
have a lasting impact.

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 Community and Local Level Risk
Reduction Programming (5)
Strategy:
• In order to materialize goals and objectives of the
National ordinance and the present Framework,
community and local level risk reduction projects
and programs will be designed and implemented
in selected districts and municipalities.
• The program may cover other hazards depending
upon the outcomes of local risk assessment and
prioritization by stakeholders.

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Mulit-Hazard Early Warning System (6)

Key Issues:
• Pakistan needs to strengthen its early warning
capacities for droughts and flooding which occur
frequently and cause high impact. EWS will need
to be developed for cyclones and tsunami, which
although are low in frequency but could have high
impact.
• Strengthening of monitoring and analysis
capabilities with relation to seismic risks and
landslides is also be a priority.
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Mulit-Hazard Early Warning System (6)

Strategy:
• Technical and operational capacities of relevant
scientific organizations (e.g. PMD, WAPDA,
Geological Survey of Pakistan, Ministry of Health
etc) to monitor and predict hazards with maximum
lead time would be developed.
• This will be done by improving and expanding the
existing technological networks.

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Main streaming of Disaster Risk Reduction
into Development Planning (7)
Key Issues:
• There is need to make effort to ensure that all
development infrastructure in hazard-prone areas
is built to higher standards e.g. schools, hospitals,
etc.
• This can be done by incorporating risk and
vulnerability assessment into project planning
stage, and including vulnerability reduction
measures in project implementation.

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Main streaming of Disaster Risk Reduction
into Development Planning (7)
Strategy:

• NDMA will work with ministries on integration of

disaster risk reduction into sectoral policy,
planning and implementation.
• It would develop technical guidelines on
incorporating risk assessment into sectoral project
planning and sectoral vulnerability reduction.

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 Emergency Response System (8)

Key Issues:
• The inability of Pakistan’s existing emergency
response system to deal with large scale
catastrophes was highlighted in the after-effects of
October 2005 earthquake.
• The government had to appoint a Federal Relief
Commissioner (FRC) to organize emergency
response.

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 Emergency Response System (8)

Strategy:
• Emergency Operations Centers would be
established at National, Provincial and District
levels under the overall supervision of NDMA,
PDMAs and DDMAs respectively.
• The National Emergency Operation Center would
serve as a hub for receiving early warning and
issuing necessary instructions to response
agencies.

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 …preparedness for disasters is
preparedness for safety, security
and preservation of our way of life…

Thank You