The New Nation - Internet Edition

CYCLONE Sidr that hit the southern zones of Bangladesh on November 15, has been extremly disastrous. Millions of people who turned homeless had to wait for relief for survival. Reports on death and injury of people in the affected areas have appeared in the press and the electronic media. The government has started providing relief materials to the affected people. Relevant official agencies have obtained fiscal support and relief materials including food grains, clothes plus medicine for distribution.

The use of resources for implementing rehabilitation programmes in the affected zone have to be optimised. Millions of people have lost their assets including standing crops plus cattle and fisheries. Domestic animals in the cyclone-hit areas died helplessly as hardly there were shelters to move those to. The existing facilities for sheltering animals had been damaged due to lack of maintenance. Cyclone shelters, inadequate though, have been built for people without provision for animals and poultry birds.

Against this backdrop, the move of the Ministries of Food and Disaster Management that one thousand new cyclone shelters will be set up in the vulnerable southern districts in the coming months sounds practical. Fifty percent of such shelters will be built with internal resources and the rest from foreign aid and donations. The existing cyclone shelters numbering over two thousand in the coastal areas would also be repaired. The major thrust may be put upon the construction of "killas", mud-forts for sheltering domestic animals as well as embankments around lakes and water-reserves to protect fish resources. The proposed mud-forts would be set up in 790 unions of twelve coastal districts. If the shelters for animals and fishes are improved and increased the loss of animals and fish may be less in future. For this, the safe zones have to be brought under effective management by officials and local government bodies including the Union Parishads, Upazila and District Councils.

Disaster management has to be kept under constant vigilance by official agencies, NGOs and local government bodies. The inflow of fiscal resources, relief materials including food and medicine, building materials and other goods has increased. The distribution of all these materials has to be efficient. The armed forces, the official agencies and private individuals and organisations have so far broadened their involvement. Along with that, the participation of the US armed forces in relief operations is expected to make the efforts more speedy and fruitful. The building of mud forts for animals as part of the preparedness programme would prove extremely useful in the event of cyclones like Sidr.