Enhancing capabilities of disaster-prone communities for effective disaster prevention and preparedness

It is essential that we feel urgency for disaster prevention and preparedness to reduce the potential loss of lives, injuries and property while keeping individuals resilient to withstand the plights in disaster-prone communities sitting in hills and low-lands where rain-hazards are invariably recurrent phenomena.

It is predictable that a spell of monsoon-triggered disasters slam Nepal every year and claim hundreds of lives and property worth million rupees. Besides, days of pounding rains cause common monsoon disasters such as landslides, mudslides, lightning, flash floods, and inundations among others which wreaks havoc on various critical infrastructures, deluging human settlements in perils. Also in many instances human settlements remain unreached by humanitarian assistance for days, weeks or even for months. As per the data maintained by the National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Authority, last year alone between April and October, the nation recorded as many as 463 deaths caused by monsoon-induced hazards—the biggest single-year casualty since the devastating earthquake of 2015—while at least 803 people were injured, 101 others went missing along with loss of property to the tune of Rs. 797.5 million.