Amity Mega Centre for Natural and Man-Made Calamities (AMCNAMC) celebrated International Day for Disaster Risk Reduction (IDDRR) by organizing an e-panel discussion on ‘Disaster Risk Governance for Building Resilient Future’. IDDRR provides an opportunity to acknowledge the progress that has been made towards reducing the risk for natural and man-made calamities. The theme for IDDRR 2020 was ‘Disaster Risk Governance’ as announced by the United Nations.
The session focused on the need to work on strategic impact assessment and mitigation plan that can respond to systemic risk generated by complex environmental breakdowns like zoonotic diseases, climate shocks and beyond. There was a collective call for coming together and work towards building Earth as a more resilient planet.
Prof. Anil Kumar Gupta (Head, Environment & Disaster Risk Management Division, National Institute of Disaster Management, New Delhi) called for thinking safety being most important first to further implement it and bring it into practice. He further stated that bringing safety in mind is a big challenge and every wrong being done by people has its effects on nature. He added that there was a tendency to put the blame on climate change for every wrong action.
Dr. Rakesh Dubey (Former Director, Disaster Management Institute, Bhopal) stated that while initially there were no instruments for aiding in disaster situations, with time government has taken steps to develop related infrastructure. He called to focus on emergency cases to manage crises effectively and having a perfect setup plan to stand in any serious situation. He further stressed for strong regulation from the point of governance.
Mr. Shashikant Chopde, Resilient Development Specialist (CC and DRR), Institute for Social and Environmental Transitions, Colorado, USA stated that governance involves having stakeholders come together and manage disaster risk and ensure that asset and resources are adequate available. He shared that one of the major reasons for the appearance of Covid was destruction of environment by humans. He stressed on the need for systematic data collection and analysis as economic infrastructure impact damage data due to disasters is not available or maintained in consistent form.
Dr. Chandan Ghosh, Professor, Dean, Students Welfare, Department of Civil Engineering., IIT, Jammu shared his views on traditional, technological & nature-based footprints in attaining resiliency.
Dr W Selvamurthy, President, Amity Science Technology and Innovation Foundation discussed how COVID-19 and the climate emergency are telling us that we need clear governance vision, plans and competent, empowered institutions acting on scientific evidence for the public good. The panel discussion was moderated by Dr S M Veerabhadrappa, Chairperson AMCNAMC and Director, Amity Institute of Geo-informatics and Remote Sensing, AUUP Noida.
Amity University had established ‘Amity Mega Center for Natural and Man-made Calamities (AMCNAMC)’ in June 2020 to contribute towards reducing the risk of Natural & Manmade disasters in India. The mega center has five pillars of operation as its functions viz. building a repository for disaster data, capacity building through training, research and consultancy, raising public awareness and disaster response.
Along with the discussion, a national level essay competition on “Disaster Risk Reduction for Building Resilient Future” was also announced for school students and a poster making competition was announced for UG & PG students. The objective of the competitions was to spread awareness of Disaster Risk Reduction amongst the younger generation.