Thank you very much and good afternoon,
I would wish if this was not so much an address, but rather just an intervention.
I have been following the disaster reduction plans and different disaster mitigation measures and adaptation issues and a whole series of things relating to climate change and what our country might face due to the consequences of what is happening to our earth.
Maldives is not a country prone to natural disasters, historically. Historically, we are situated in a very, in a sense, a calmer belt than many other countries. We have a written history of more 1,500 years and you can, from that, deduce and derive how frequent and how often we have had climate challenges or natural disasters. My reading of it is that it is not very often. When it happens, it is very well documented and therefore, we may be able to deduce something out of that.
But recently in the past, maybe in the past half a century, things have changed, in my mind. I am not an expert in this, but I do read about what happens in this country. I have a feeling that there is a drastic aberration from what we are used to.
Elders are complaining, fishermen are complaining that the fish are not coming at the time that they used to come, the winds are not at the time that they used to be, the rains are not at the time that they used be and when it comes, it is not to the extent or perhaps sometimes a lot more vigorously than it used to be.
So perhaps it is because of this. Perhaps it is because we have not had to give so much thought to disasters that we have not been able to come up with a proper framework of trying to manage a more resilient framework of things. Therefore, now it is more important that we come up with a proper framework of how we may be able to meet these challenges.
In this sense, I think I have some figures of what has been happening in the past. Recent estimates show that an island can lose half a million dollars from flooding and even two to thirty million dollars from a swell wave and storm surges, depending of course on the island and on the event. But if you have a look at what has happened in the last fifty years, these are the kind of general costs that we have had to bare. So therefore, it is so much more prudent for us to have in mind an idea of how we may be able to manage ourselves more resiliently than what we have been doing. To get even minimum protection from these issues is very, very expensive. To give protection to Male', for instance, has cost the Japanese government, rather, more than 6million dollars. If we did not have the seawall around Male' when the tsunami came, we wouldn’t have been able to respond at all. During the tsunami, we were only able to respond two days later. That was also because Male' was left intact. Now, if Male' had to face the same challenges as other islands nearby, we wouldn't have the situation that we are in now. But then again, the point here is protecting Male' was extremely expensive but then the issue is protecting Male' is well worth it. We have to now go about protecting other islands and other communities and we have to be fairly intelligent in the manner in which we deal with it.
Physical adaptation is very expensive but that is perhaps because we have been dealing with it in a rather heavy manner. Engineering is very heavy and engineering is therefore very expensive. We may be able to come out with softer engineering methods, perhaps some biological engineering as well. But for this we have to understand a lot more than what we understand now.
This government, before we were fortunate a government, we did contemplate on these issues and we did compose a manifesto that highlighted these issues in many, many ways. It remains now for us to be able to try and implement that. And when we try to do that, I have come across a number of works. Let's say, there is a national protection programme of action for climate change, there is a national environment action plan, there is a technology needs assessment for climate change, there is national capacity self assessment, and now the strategic national action plan. Perhaps, all of these things are trying to do the same thing. And duplication would make these issues even more expensive. So if we can also focus ourselves into a more consolidated manner of doing thins, it might also be more helpful for us. I'm sure the strategic national action plan is very comprehensive, but this doesn't necessarily say that all the other plans, reports and documents available on the subject are not. So we have to see how we may be able to bring all of this to one piece of paper and try to move with a singular focus.
The government plans to, or we wish to come out with a survival kit. We would like to consolidate all the plans and then call it a survival kit. Basically that would, on the one hand, highlight resilient management programmes and how building codes should be set up, how legislations can be worked out, how physical adaptation can happen and also how we may be able to come up with our carbon neutral plan, and also how we may be able to capture carbon. So I would like to see all of this together and would like to call it our survival kit. It is this kit that we now have to come out with. It is an action plan, or perhaps the United Nations' language for it is in terms of action plan, but our manifesto and our narratives have been more rather in an alternative language.
We would like to try and make our people aware that they have to act according to this survival kit and I think it might be possible for us to be able to sell a document to the people in a more attractive manner. Now, if we can't get our people behind any of these plans it won't succeed. However much we may try to do it if we can't talk to our people and if we can’t consult with them, I really find it very difficult to believe that any of these plans can succeed. But we are very optimistic. We know that the issue is very serious. We know what the price of failure can be – it is the loss of our nation. And therefore, we cannot be complacent about this.
I wish well for everyone and I thank everyone for the hard work that you have been doing, especially the Disaster Management Unit that has gone through the work and that has been trying to come up with the strategic national action plan this time. But then again, the Ministry of Environment has also in many instances come up with a number of documents and the Ministry of Planning, the planning agency that we had, also has come up with a number of documents. I think it's just again, I would like to stress, that it is so important to have a singular focus and it is so important to move in a consolidated manner.
Thank you very much.
