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By Joyce Mukucha
By the year 2030, an estimated 50 per cent of the world’s population that live in coastal areas will be exposed to extreme weather events such as flooding, storms and tsunamis, the United Nations(UN) has warned.
Marking this year’s World Tsunami Awareness Day on the 4th of November 2021 against this background, the UN said it was imperative to enhance international cooperation for developing nations to reduce disasters.
The UN Secretary-General , Antonio Guterres said risks and threats remain immense urging all countries, civil society, international bodies and other relevant stakeholders to work unanimously in coming up with innovative approaches, solutions and mechanisms aimed at reducing natural hazards.
“Science, international cooperation, preparedness and early action must be at the centre of all efforts to keep people and communities safer. Boosting support to developing countries and improving detection and early warning is critical. In the face of increasing complex global crises, we need to be better prepared.
“We can build on progress achieved – ranging from better outreach to tsunami-exposed communities around the world, to the inclusion of a Tsunami Programme in the UN Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainable Development,” Guterres said.
He added that rising sea levels caused by the climate emergency will further exacerbate the destructive power of tsunamis.
“We must limit warming to 1.5 degrees over pre-industrial averages and invest at scale in the resilience of coastal communities.”
It has also been indicated that rapid urbanization and growing tourism in regions prone to tsunamis, are also putting even more people in harm’s way.
Following that the 2021, World Tsunami Awareness Day was promoting the “Sendai Seven Campaign”, specifically the target that looks to enhance international cooperation to developing countries, the Secretary-General appealed to countries to deliver on the Sendai Framework, and, together, build resilience against all disasters.
Tsunamis are the single most deadly of all sudden onset natural hazards. The UNESCO-IOC Tsunami Ready Programme aims to make 100% of tsunami-prone areas tsunami-ready and resilient by 2030.
Tsunamis are rare events but can be extremely deadly. In the past 100 years, 58 of them have claimed more than 260,000 lives, or an average of 4,600 per disaster – more than any other natural hazard.
According to UN, the highest number of deaths occurred in the Indian Ocean tsunami of December 2004 caused an estimated 227,000 fatalities across 14 countries. Indonesia, Sri Lanka, India and Thailand were the hardest hit.
Just three weeks after the disaster, the international community came together in Kobe, Japan, and adopted the 10-year Hyogo Framework for Action , the first comprehensive global agreement on disaster risk reduction.
UN highlighted that they also created the Indian Ocean Tsunami Warning and Mitigation System , which uses seismographic and sea-level monitoring stations to send alerts to national tsunami information centres.
After the Hyogo Framework for Action expired, in 2014, the world adopted the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction 2015-2030 , outlining seven clear targets and four priorities to prevent and reduce disaster risks.