The effectiveness of community-based disaster response project in Quy Hop
(Baonghean) - In recent years, the mountainous district of Quy Hop has continuously suffered from many historic storms and floods, causing heavy losses to socio-economic development and threatening the stability of people's lives. A typical example is the flash flood in 2009 that killed 1 person, injured 5 people, flooded 829 houses, and washed away 49 houses; damaged 12 dams, over 25 km of canals, 34 bridges and culverts of all kinds, destroyed 26 km of roads, 136 electric poles, 3,200 04KW power lines, and more than 1,000 hectares of crops of all kinds...
In order to reduce risks caused by natural disasters, the French humanitarian and development organization (ACTED) and the Canadian Center for International Cooperation and Research (CECI) are two non-governmental organizations that jointly implement the project "Improving capacity for community-based disaster prevention and response" in 3 mountainous communes of Quy Hop district. This project was implemented from May 2010 to September 2011 in 33 hamlets in 3 extremely disadvantaged mountainous communes of Quy Hop district: Chau Dinh, Chau Loc and Lien Hop. The overall goal of the project is to increase resilience and reduce vulnerability to natural disasters for the people.
Move people's assets out of areas at risk of natural disasters.
when the flood comes
After more than a year of implementation, the project has initially brought very practical and useful results. Mr. Luu Xuan Diem, Deputy Head of the Department of Agriculture and Rural Development of Quy Hop district, said: The project has built a team of trainers, completed a plan to respond to natural disasters in remote areas; supported community capacity and skills to cope with nature, helped ethnic people in remote and mountainous areas with life skills, skills to cope with nature; completed a set of communication documents for the organization's collaborators for hamlet and commune cadres; shared experiences with cadres from district to commune, hamlet and school students; supported the construction of a number of works for 3 communes to benefit.
In integrating the implementation of socio-economic development tasks associated with climate change adaptation, special attention should be paid to planning work on: socio-economic development, infrastructure construction; population arrangement, adjustment and rearrangement suitable to the conditions of each region... The project coordination board has supported nearly 800 million VND for localities to build 5 economic and people's livelihood projects such as: project to adjust the flow of Dinh River flowing through Chau Dinh commune, reinforce canals in Duoc hamlet, Lien Hop commune, concretize 500m of canals in Inh hamlet, Chau Loc, repair My Tan bridge and culvert, build new bridges and roads between Chau Que and Chau Dinh hamlets; build early warning systems including: 6 alarm systems, 20 danger signs, equip life-saving tools such as life jackets, ropes, hats, raincoats, walkie-talkies, flashlights, stretchers...
Identifying children and the elderly as vulnerable to natural disasters, the Project Coordination Board of ACTED and CECI went to the villages of the beneficiary communes to survey and set up a project to build support programs for students. In particular, the Project Coordination Board coordinated with the district Department of Education and Training, 7 high schools and secondary schools of the beneficiary communes to train teachers on teaching methods and integrate propaganda on natural disaster prevention in schools.
The project has initially brought about practical results, but only within a limited scope in 3 communes. For the project to be truly implemented synchronously and expanded to all localities in the entire district, it requires the participation of all levels, sectors and the support of the entire community.
Huy Nham
