Ratu Ganilau - Opening Address at the 14th Regional Disaster Managers Meeting
Jul 21, 2008, 10:16

14TH REGIONAL DISASTER MANAGERS MEETING
Nadi, 21st – 22nd July 2008

Opening Address – Ratu Epeli Ganilau
Minister for Defence, National Security and Immigration - Fiji



The Director, Pacific Islands Applied Geoscience Commission
Regional Disaster Managers
Regional and International Partners
Ladies and Gentlemen,

I wish to thank you all for being here this evening on the occasion of this the 14th Regional Disaster Managers Meeting and on behalf of the Government of Fiji warmly welcome you to our shores. I especially welcome the regional disaster managers for making the effort to attend and to participate once more in the upcoming discussions on matters of disaster risk management in the Pacific.

I also wish to extend a special and warm welcome to Dr. Ir Suprayoga Hadi who has joined us all the way from Indonesia. I understand that during the meeting Dr. Hadi will present the experience of Indonesia in terms of the efforts made to mainstream disaster risk reduction and disaster management into Indonesia’s national planning and budgetary systems. Learning of such experiences enriches our own and adds value to our efforts in the Pacific. Perhaps there may be lessons also from the Pacific which could be of some value for Indonesia.

The participation of Dr. Hadi at this meeting is an indication of potential partnerships and strategic alliances that our countries in the Pacific can have with our neighbours in Asia. Last year I headed a Fiji delegation that attended the 2nd Asian Ministerial Meeting on Disaster Reduction in Delhi. We learned there of the experience of our Asian friends and I am glad that this occasion provides an opportunity for many more of us to lessons learnt. Hopefully agencies like SOPAC and other partners can contribute to building of South-South cooperation between our countries in the Pacific and countries in Asia like Indonesia.

I wish Dr. Hadi enjoys his short stay and hope that my Pacific colleagues will use the opportunity of your presence to get to know you and perhaps to develop a relationship that will endure.

This meeting is the second within the space of five years to be jointly hosted by the Government of Fiji and SOPAC. In 2003, the 11th Regional Disaster Managers Meeting was held at the Outrigger Resort along the Coral Coast near Sigatoka and some of you who were present at that time are again here for this meeting. I take this as a very encouraging sign; that there is a consistency in the level of commitment and support that our countries in the region are making on matters relating to disaster risk management. It also must be encouraging to those of you representing development partners regional and international organisations that the investments you’ve made in building capacity and strengthening institutions within each country have taken root and that the individuals in whom you have invested continue to be the mainstay of national disaster risk management systems.

The Regional Disaster Managers Meeting has also I understand from this year been re-established as an annual event and I believe that this is in recognition that so much is happening in relation to disaster risk management that the previous bi-ennial format is perhaps not appropriate anymore. Furthermore, it is in my humble opinion, a recognition of the role of disaster risk management in achieving the VISION of the Regional Framework for Action 2005 – 2015 as approved by the Forum Leaders in the Kalibobo Roadmap that is the development of “safer, more resilient Pacific Island nations and communities to disasters, so that Pacific peoples may achieve sustainable livelihoods and lead free and worthwhile lives.”

We also feel that since SOPAC, the regional intergovernmental organisation with the regional mandate for disaster risk management capacity building, is located here we must be first to support their efforts and indeed those of the other major partners. SOPAC has been part of Fiji’s landscape for many years now and we value our relationship with them as I’m sure you do also.

The theme for this years meeting is: Disaster Risk Reduction and Disaster Management in Pacific Island Countries: Addressing National Challenges to Enhance Mainstreaming. It is my understanding that the theme was selected as a means of building on the efforts made at the meeting held in the Marshall Islands last year which also examined the issue of mainstreaming disaster risk management. This year the intention is to review the progress made and to look at opportunities to strengthen national mainstreaming efforts. It is in this connection that we will all share in the experience of Indonesia and also have the opportunity to revisit some of our own recent Pacific experiences. The meeting is to also examine some of tools and support facilities that are being, or have recently been developed to support national mainstreaming efforts. Further, you also have an opportunity to provide input into a guide for mainstreaming of disaster risk reduction and disaster management at the national, local and at community level.

An additional focus of this years meeting is to provide an opportunity for disaster managers to share in the development of a tool which will report national progress against the Pacific Disaster Risk Reduction and Disaster Management Framework for Action 2005 – 2015, or Regional Framework as it is now commonly referred to. The Regional Framework is the current overarching policy document that guides disaster risk management in the Pacific. It was developed in mid 2005 following the adoption by World leaders of the Hyogo Framework for Action in January 2005. The Regional Framework provides the basic guidelines for developing approaches to mainstreaming efforts for Pacific Island countries. As a policy document with regional commitment it behoves us to report to our leaders on the progress that we’ve made against it and we should all embrace this responsibility.

Whilst this occasion is principally about the 14th Regional Disaster Managers Meeting it is pertinent to note that over the course of this week another 2 important meetings will be held here. The second meeting is the 3rd Annual Meeting of the Pacific Disaster Risk Management Partnership Network at which the various member organisations will examine ways to actually improve the level of disaster risk management engagement in our countries I believe they should be applauded for this.

The third meeting this week is an inaugural meeting of Pacific Chief Executives or Permanent Secretaries, as they are referred to in some countries, of the Ministries of Finance & Planning with their colleagues that are responsible for Disaster Management. This meeting will raise the bar so to speak for involvement of Pacific bureaucracies in the business of disaster risk management. Our Prime Minister, Commodore Frank Bainimarama has been kindly invited to open the CEOs meeting and I know that he, like I, am excited by this development. We have an opportunity to build on this upcoming meeting to provide greater impetus for the efforts at mainstreaming undertaken thus far.

There are however always at the least two sides to every story and that is true for hazards and disaster risk management. In the old days and in many places even now it was just Disaster Management which meant basically preparedness response and recovery. Now the accepted terminology so it seems is Disaster Risk Management which has two elements: Disaster Risk Reduction and Disaster Management.

As I understand it you are here for this meeting under the title of National Disaster Managers of the National Disaster Management Office. Please forgive me if I am a bit confused about terminologies and what they mean. I hope that you will enlighten me a bit more during our two day meeting.

But what I want to say following your Marshall Island meeting last year, and to the other two meetings later on this week is that Disaster Risk Management is critical and it is imperative that we are able to convince Pacific Island Countries of its importance and the need for its implementation. However, and in spite of theDRM emphasis, disasters will occur for as the World Bank stated: disasters are never questions of IF but always a question of WHEN.

For this meeting of NDMO’s I would like to say that Disaster Risk Reduction is important but that at the same time Disaster Management will always be critical and that it should not be unintentionally allowed to fade into the background because of Disaster Risk Reduction. The former deals with the realities of living and the latter deals with the realities of probabilities. Both of course are interdependent. If Disaster Risk Reduction is successful, then Disaster Management will be more successful for the impact has been reduced. If Disaster Risk Reduction is not implemented, then Disaster Management becomes a serous burden on lives, livelihoods and sustainable development. The Pacific Island Countries need both and that is the core of the message that SOPAC is trying to get across this week.

Perhaps for us in this, the first of these meetings we should start with the reality of life and move to the realities of probabilities when we believe that we at least have a sound platform to deal with what happens when a disaster occurs, as it will.

In my humble opinion, and I of course stand corrected by your own expertise and experience, there is still a great need for institutional development, capacity building and resourcing of the more mundane business of Disaster Management. Even with the technical applications of its awesome capabilities (eg. levies etc). New Orleans still suffered badly and FEMA with all its resources had great difficulties dealing with the realities of life when Katrina came and went. The same problem has happened at a such reduced scale in Tonga with Cyclone Waga, in Fiji with many more and I am sure all of you have had similar experiences.

This week SOPAC has given us a chance to continue the development of both as well as a chance to see under the dynamics of interdependence of the two sides of DRM. In the end it is necessary that the two sides are recognised and strategised as one. The raison d’etre of DRM, Disaster Risk Reduction and Disaster Management is greater security of lives and livelihoods – sustainable development. As such it is not a one-off event but a continuous process.

The role of NDMO’s in Disaster Risk Management is central and critical. Your task is one of the most difficult for you need the technical capability but also the political will of leaders and it is difficult because DRM or just simple Disaster Management is a complex array of political, social, economic, environmental, science and technical forces interacting in different ways in an ever changing environment.

I have no doubt that you as NDMO’s fully understand the problem and even more so then I do. The issue for you in this meeting as I understand it is how to move forward towards an integrated solution. I can only offer you support, encouragement and perhaps, as a non-expert, some thinking outside the box.

I would also like to say that Pacific Island Countries and people recognise your role and contributions for you are the ones that stand up when they are at their most vulnerable. It has never been easy and it will never be an easy task. The ‘realities of life’ is your field and the ‘realities of probabilities’ is the additional tool in achieving adaptation to hazards, climate change manifestations and to disasters. Disaster Risk Management in both its manifestations is essential to build greater sustainability and as such to sustainable development.

This I hope highlights that while historically our respective systems in the Pacific were established principally to address disaster response, the changing face of disaster risk management requires that more stakeholders are involved and that there is greater ownership of the disaster risk management at all levels within society. I believe our Government systems have a critical role to play in this but also believe that Governments alone cannot manage the challenge. It requires many players to be involved.

Addressing the challenge of mainstreaming within Pacific countries is thus a collective responsibility: of Governments, non governmental organisations, community groups, of the business sector and of our partners. Together all can make a difference.

I thank you once again for choosing Fiji as your venue to hold this meeting. I do wish you all a pleasant stay and hope that you may be able to have some free time to share our Fiji with us. Please do take some time out to share in the richness of our culture and the experience of our warm hospitality.

Ladies and gentleman it is now my privilege and honour to declare this 14th Regional Disaster Managers Meeting officially open.


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