The National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) on Thursday, July 1 released its 2021 Disaster Risk Management Implications Report (DRM) to guide effective and timely management of flood and associated hazards in the country.
The Director-General of the agency, Mr Ahmed Habib, while presenting the document in Abuja, said the report would support NEMA’s partners to disseminate early warning messages to the public.
He said that the document was the outcome of the detailed analysis of the Seasonal Climate Prediction and Annual Flood Outlook earlier released by the Nigerian Meteorological Agency (NiMet) and the Nigeria Hydrological Services Agency (NIHSA) respectively.
“This document will also identify communities at risk and safe locations for the setting up of temporary shelters through its risk mapping.
“The document also enables planning for the stockpiling and prepositioning of humanitarian relief for appropriate and timely intervention to persons affected by floods and associated hazards,” he said.
Habib, who called on the media to help disseminate information on disaster mitigation, adaption, response and recovery, added that the agency would also deploy new and traditional communication channels.
“It has become necessary to deploy new and traditional communication pathways including the radio, television, town criers and social media to take this message to vulnerable communities.
“As we always say at NEMA, every disaster happens in a particular community, in a particular local government and in a particular state.
“Disasters are always local, we must therefore give local responders the right information to enable effective disaster risk communication.
“We must match early warning with early action to save lives, safeguard livelihoods and our collective resilience,” he said.
In his remarks, the Director-General, NIHSA, Mr Clement Nze, assured of his agency’s readiness to collaborate with NEMA in their mandate of making the country disaster free.
NiMet had predicted an annual rainfall amount of between ‘normal rainfalls to above-normal for most parts of the country.
NIHSA in its 2021 Flood Outlook predicted that 121 local government areas in 27 states and the FCT will expect a high probability of flood, while 302 local government areas will experience moderate risk of floods.
By Ruth Oketunde
