NADMO observes World Disaster Reduction Day …with concentration on women and children

The Eastern Regional office of the National Disaster Management Organisation (NADMO), on Friday, observed the celebration of the 2012 World Disaster Reduction Day, with serious concentration on women and children during disasters.

The International Day for Disaster Reduction (IDDR) was started in 1989, with the approval by the United Nations General Assembly as a way to promote a global culture of disaster reduction.

The IDDR aims to raise awareness about the importance of Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR), and the most widely observed day for raising awareness and mobilising the wider public to get involved and take ownership of the process to create disaster resilience.

This year’s celebration was under the theme “Women and Girls – The (in)visible Force of Resilience.”

Speaking at the programme, the Eastern Regional Coordinator of NADMO, Mr. Ransford Owusu Boakye, said human beings had been at the mercy of natural disasters since the beginning of time.

According to him, most often, the images of suffering women and children during disasters were popular, and normally portrayed, because women have less access to resources and influence among others, which were essential to disaster management.

He acknowledged that his office had taken note that disaster reduction programmes which did not include women and children leads to the overlooking of their needs and concerns.

He said the building of institutional capacity should involve women and girls in Disasters Risk Reduction (DRR), so that they would not be extremely vulnerable during and after disasters strike in the country.

“We have taken note that disaster reduction programmes which do not include women and girls participation, means that their particular needs and concerns, and their potential contributions are overlooked during disaster preparedness, response, and reconstruction.”

There is a critical shift in the mainstreaming of gender perspectives into DRR, from the women- focused approach to a gender focused one, based on the premise that the roles and relationships of women and men in disaster risk reduction should analyzed within the overall gendered socio-economic and cultural context.

This has, therefore, changed the strategic focus of disaster management, from reactive disaster response to long-term proactive disaster risk, and vulnerability reduction and resilience building, where gender and DRR are considered necessary to achieving sustainable development

Short URL: http://thechronicle.com.gh/?p=48491