PESHAWAR:A one-day workshop on “Needs Gaps Analysis for National Disaster Preparedness and Response” in collaboration with NDMA, PDMA and University of Engineering Technology (UET) Peshawar was held here on Monday.
The workshop was aimed at bringing together experts and professionals to assess the policy gaps to garner global collaborations for innovative solutions for effectiveness in all aspects of disaster management.
Jannat Gul, DG PDMA Peshawar said, to create awareness on natural disasters, a unified response is needed with the help of academia, government and civil society.
He said “We do not have data of our local wisdom that has to be gathered by our Public Section Institutions to find out real-life solutions”.
The Vice Chancellor UET Prof. Dr. Iftikhar Hussain said that the Department of Civil Engineering and EEC UET has worked with NDMA in the revision of the seismic building code 2021 and helped the department develop seismic hazard map.
He said that in recent years, “We have witnessed the severe consequences of floods, earthquakes and climate change which call for a unified response for mitigation and response for devising disaster management strategies. Prof. Dr. Khan Shahzada, Department of Civil Engineering, gave a detailed presentation on UET Peshawar’s role in disaster preparedness and response. The Vice-Chancellor appreciated the efforts of Prof. Dr. Rawid Khan, UET Peshawar for arranging the workshop.
Dr. Fazal Ahmad Khan, Rector GIK, Swabi urged for exploiting AI-based solutions to deal with such challenges and create more awareness for policy-making and engage academia to find AI based solutions for a quick response and mitigate risks involved in Pakistan and across the world.
He stressed having a reliable data collection mechanism where universities are central to work in this area.
He said, our graduates in the field hold more importance besides technology to suggest sustainable solutions.
He urged to start a joint degree program in the field of disaster management and UET needs to be at the central place in offering the same program where policy-level recommendations to the government.
Dr. Muhammad Tayyab Shah, Manager Risk Assessment NDMA, Islamabad also spoke on the occasion.
He said that Pakistan is in the top ten countries affected and vulnerable by climate change according to the Global Vulnerability Index. Therefore, it calls for a more proactive approach which has been helped by NDMA.
The NDMA has established seventeen satellites with the help of national and international agencies including NASA, EU , Japan and SUPARCO. All these will help us in getting remote sensing data and model models.
The workshop included thematic sessions in which participants from NDMA, UET Peshawar, KUST, CDPM (UoP), MCE Rasalpur, KUST, GIKI, Hazara University and Abdul Wali Khan University, Mardan participated and gave presentations on different areas with respect to disaster management and collaboration.