Eswatini still at risk of natural disasters - DPM
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MBABANE – EmaSwati are still at risk of natural disasters as the country struggles to implement disaster management plans and launching the Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR) fund.
This is according to a statement that was made by the Deputy Prime Minister (DPM), Themba Masuku, on Thursday evening in New York City during the High-Level Meeting of the General Assembly on the Mid-term Review of the Implementation of the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR) 20152030.
The High-Level Meeting on the Mid-term Review of the Sendai Framework took place from Wednesday and lasted until yesterday. The Sendai Framework had four pillars. It priorities for action in understanding, strengthening disaster risk governance to manage disaster risk as well as investing in disaster risk reduction or resilience.
The DPM left on Sunday together with Principal Secretary (PS) Melusi Masuku, the National Disaster Management (NDMA) Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Russell Dlamini, among other senior officials, to attend the High-Level Meeting.
On Thursday, when presenting the country’s progress, he noted that the Sendai Framework brought a large number of stakeholders to work together at local and international level.
Challenges
Masuku stated that financing of disaster risk management was one of the biggest challenges that a country with a small economy like Eswatini faced.
“Inadequate finance slows down the implementation of disaster risk management plans and leaves everyone vulnerable even when the risk is known and can be prevented. While our country is on course to develop a disaster risk management fund, there are already concerns that it may not be adequately capitalised to meet the cost of loss and damage caused by the impact of climate change. This calls for climate change and DRR practitioners and institutions to work together to prevent duplication, and maximise the use of limited resources,” he said.
To ensure that the country improved its disaster management, Masuku told the delegates that Eswatini would institutionalise systemic risk monitoring through the development of a disaster risk management monitoring framework as well as through the implementation of the Global Risk Framework in collaboration with the United Nations Disaster Risk Reduction (UNDRR).
He added that Eswatini will continue to work with UNDRR and SADC to improve understanding of risk, which is one of the priorities of the Sendai Framework for DRR.
“The country will also launch a National Platform for DRR, which will ensure active and meaningful participation of communities and all sectors of our economy in disaster risk reduction,” he said.