PAPUA New Guinea must urgently build its capacity to deal with the green house effects (global warming) on the world environment, experts in disaster management said yesterday.
Experts with the National Weather Service, Fire Service, National Disaster and Emergency Service and National Maritime Safety Authority said PNG must enact laws, obtain and install the latest technologies available to predict and prepare for natural disasters and train people to understand and translate information on weather competently for dissemination to the people.
“PNG needs to invest millions of kina on mitigation and preparedness and this is urgently needed.
“We are spending millions on recover exercises but this can be avoided if we prepare properly,” director of the Morobe Disaster and Emergency Service Roy Kamen said.
The experts said global warming was directly responsible for the changes in the climate today including the increase in cyclones, and the country must be equipped to read the danger signals and translate the information and disseminate it quickly to the people to act before they were hit by the disaster.
“The sea level is rising and this is affecting the weather pattern.
“We need laws to be enacted to ensure safe travel at sea, the latest equipment to predict and prepare for natural disasters and train our people to translate information competently and sent it out to the people quickly.
“Right now, we as a country, are not ready,” Karo Kenneth Guria of the National Maritime Safety Authority (NMSA) said.
The NMSA, in a paper presented at the June National Disaster and Emergency conference in Lae, said laws were needed to make it mandatory for vessels and small boats to install electronic devices that send out distress signals to land for rescuers to respond quickly and locate those in trouble.
In his paper, the director of Search and Rescue Eka Elore said at present, it was a guessing game that his office was involved in when trying to locate boats in distress.
“I have just returned from Thailand where I attended a seminar on disaster and rescue.
“I was staggered at the efforts and money spent by Asian countries on mitigation and preparedness. These countries are way ahead of us and we live in a disaster prone region,” Mr Kamen said.
An example, the experts gave was the current disaster in Oro and the failure to warn the people quickly and on time.
They were not alone in being critical of the roles these organisations play. Relatives of people caught in the disaster and members of the public called The National to express similar sentiments.
They said the inability of the country to monitor the weather, process information quickly and send out warnings for people to prepare themselves contributed greatly to the loss of lives and properties.