Need For Increased Asean Funding To Cope With Natural Disasters

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THE unprecedented massive flooding in Southeast Asia has led to enormous socioeconomic loss of billions of dollars, huge human fatalities, infrastructural and general damage with Vietnam, Thailand, Indonesia, the Philippines and Malaysia bearing the brunt of the tragedies.
One can easily attribute this massive deluge to the disastrous effects of climate change, which will continue to wreak havoc in the foreseeable future.
Despite some token measures to counter climate change and unpredictable weather patterns nothing can offset the fury of nature as serious environmental damage has been done in the last few decades.
The people cannot do much and will be affected by these natural calamities from time to time. Governments too have to cope with the massive economic loss and damage to infrastructure that will cost billions to repair or rehabilitate. As such, learning to cope with the seasonal and freak natural disasters is the right way.
The ASEAN region is perhaps the most volatile when it comes to natural calamities, including earthquakes, tsunamis, torrential rain, flooding and landslides, cyclones and typhoons, volcanic eruptions, forest fires, droughts that threaten agriculture and potable water supplies, and the regional haze.
Some of the disasters cannot be averted as they are natural. However, some are man-made and were brought upon by the large clearing of forests for oil palm and other agriculture.
The massive oil palm plantations and smallholdings have led to economic development and help overcome poverty for millions in the region.
Durian cultivation to cater to the big demand for durians from China too has resulted in deforestation of large areas in Indo-China, Thailand and Myanmar. There is also rapid clearing of jungles in Papua New Guinea for the lucrative oil palm cultivation.
The clock cannot be turned back and both the people and government have to face this harsh reality of changing weather patterns.
Governments need to upgrade the search and rescue efforts using the latest technology considering the big loss in human lives especially in Vietnam, Indonesia, Thailand and the tropical cyclone that battered the Philippines.
Sri Lanka, though not part of Southeast Asia, was another country devastated by the floods and human losses. Although there are regional and international disaster funds to assist the people, they may not be enough considering the socioeconomic losses.
There is therefore a need to increase contributions to snowball the ASEAN Agreement on Disaster Management and Emergency Response (AADMER) Fund to more than a billion dollars for assistance schemes to help rebuild homes, infrastructure, loss of livelihoods and also to prevent diseases brought about by the natural calamities.
The governments need to request the oil palm plantation companies and durian exporters—both of whom are reaping windfall profits—to contribute to the fund annually to enable the fund to snowball to a reasonably high level.
Both the oil palm and durian exporters should do this as part of their social and humanitarian duty as it is the large scale deforestation and clearings that have, together with climate change, brought this unprecedented man-made disasters.
Countries unaffected by the present rains and floods should help one another and cooperate in the spirit of ASEAN friendship. 
V. Thomas is a Focus Malaysia viewer.
The views expressed are solely of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of  MMKtT.
- Focus Malaysia.

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