7 January, 2005

Haves and have-nots

What happened in the Indian Ocean is the worst earthquake disaster ever in history. As a citizen of one of the world's most earthquake-prone nations, this does matter to me. There are lots of earthquakes in Japan. It's been only two weeks since I came back to Japan. But I've already experienced two earthquakes. Scary.

I came across an article, in the BBC website, about quake and tsunami measures in Japan. In this article, writer Jamie Miyazaki says;

Underpinning this cutting-edge warning system are strict new building laws to protect against tsunamis and quakes, and good disaster planning that have so far kept Japanese casualties from such natural disasters low for such a vulnerable nation.

However, he adds, "the system comes with a price-tag - around US$20m a year." As he says, of course, this is too expensive to poorer nations - like the countries affected by the quake. And he concludes;

With some underwater quakes in Japan occurring just a few kilometres offshore, it could take only five minutes for tsunamis to hit land. That would make even Japan's cutting-edge system effectively useless, without further advances.

Even though Japan spends enormous money in the tsunami/quake system, terrible power of nature can be surpass Japan's technology. I think we know power of nature is immense. But we need to make efforts to minimize the damage. Some say if the countries, which have incured massive damage in this quake, had any system, the things would have been much better. But they don't have money. Where can they find money to allocate such an invisible monster? Before it, there are so many problems to be solved.

This makes me think why poorer people (always) have to be vulnerable. Almost all problems on this planet we have to combat are related to them. AIDS, hunger, malnutrition, conflict, bla bla bla... How can haves deal with the gap between them and have-nots? Ummm, difficult.

» BBC News | How Japan handles tsunami threat
5 January 2005
By Jamie Miyazaki