By IPS Correspondents
PORT LOUIS, Mauritius, Jan 13 2005 (IPS)

In the aftermath of the tsunami upheaval that caught the world totally unprepared, U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan is urging a comprehensive global plan against other natural catastrophes as well.

"We need a global warning system – and one that covers not just tsunamis but all other threats, such as storm surges and cyclones," Annan told the 110-nation U.N. conference on assisting Small Island Developing States (SIDS), many of which are vulnerable to the vagaries of nature.

"In such an endeavour, no part of the world should be ignored," the secretary-general added Thursday, as the Jan. 10-14 meeting in Mauritius moved into the "high-level segment" involving participation of heads of state and government. "We must think globally, and consider measures equal to the task."

The chances of realising such a plan could be good in an international community galvanised since the Dec. 26 killer waves that claimed over 160,000 lives in 13 countries in Asia, including Indian Ocean island nations.

The proposal is also likely to be a major theme of the Jan. 18-22 World Conference on Disaster Reduction in Kobe, Japan, the site of the first major earthquake in a large city in a developed country in recent history. The quake claimed over 6,000 lives in the early hours of Jan. 17, 1995.

Michel Jarraud, secretary-general of the World Meteorological Organisation (WMO), told IPS in an interview that the existing global warning systems on storms could easily be linked to a proposed one on tsunami. He said he was not sure if an enlarged system should also include other calamities, for fear that it may loose its focus.

He said 10 percent of funds now directed to humanitarian relief – the total is six billion dollars a year – should be earmarked for early warning systems and preparedness.

World Bank Vice President Ian Goldin told journalists that the international lender would "look very seriously at all proposals in investing in early warning systems."

EU Commissioner for Development and Humanitarian Aid Louis Michel said the EU will participate in contributing necessary funds, adding that the precise figure cannot be determined until the actual costs are known.

At this week’s SIDS conference, the chairman of the Group of 77 and China, Nassir Abdulaziz Al-Nasser, called for international support for early warning disaster preparedness and risk reduction strategies.

Prime Minister Paul Raymond Berenger of host Mauritius mentioned the possibility of a "Special Trust Fund" for early warning systems and national readiness.

The tsunami catastrophe, etching the date Dec. 26 in the same vein as Sept. 11, brought to the fore a fact that was fast receding from attention: the year 2004 was a particularly bad one in terms of natural disasters.

As many as 14 major tropical storms in the Caribbean during the latest hurricane season took thousands of lives and caused devastation with losses estimated at 20 billion dollars.

Rising sea levels in the Pacific region threatened to completely submerge the islands of Nauru, Maldives and Tuvalu. In the Indian Ocean, tropical cyclone Gafilo, the most intense ever observed in this zone by Météo France, struck the Comoros and Madagascar, causing over 200 casualties.

Exact losses for 2004 are yet to be calculated, but should be much higher than in 2003, when they reached 60 billion dollars, according to U.N. figures.

Such extreme weather-related events are seen by many as empirical evidence of the impact of climate change. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) expects increased tropical cyclones in the future, adding fuel to the necessity for early warning systems and preparedness.

With these back in mind, the focus now shifts to Kobe, where the aim will be to reduce the level of risk.

"Early warning was always going to be a main subject to be discussed at the World Conference on Disaster Reduction. Now, this subject is all the more relevant following the devastation that occurred on Dec. 26 in southern Asia," said Briceño.

"We are not starting from scratch. Risk maps are already available and many countries in the Indian Ocean have early warning systems for other types of natural hazards such as floods and cyclones," added the director of the International Strategy for Disaster Reduction secretariat.

And "Existing international warning organisations already detect earthquakes and connect relevant authorities with each other," he noted.

There are also hopes that concrete steps to be taken will emerge from the Kobe parley. Experts recall that the 1990-1999 U.N. International Decade for Natural Disaster Reduction, dedicated to promoting solutions to reduce risk from natural hazards, ended with more deaths from a larger number of disasters, involving greater economic losses, human dislocation and suffering, than when it began.

U.N. figures show that the number of people at risk grows by 70 to 80 million per year, with the poor hit the hardest by natural hazards such as earthquakes, floods, drought, storms, tropical cyclones and hurricanes, wildfires, tsunami, volcanic eruptions and landslides.

At next week’s international conference in Kobe, efforts will focus on raising the profile of disaster risk reduction in development planning and in practice – and on creating "a culture of prevention".

"Should disaster strike again, and it will, in some parts of the world, we must be able to say that we did everything humanly possible to build resilient societies," Annan told the Mauritius gathering.

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