Reuters AlertNet, UK
Osman is the director of policy and relations division at the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC). Here he asks why fewer people are dying from disasters even as more people are being affected.
As the floodwaters receded from across two-thirds of Bangladesh during September and upwards of 30 million stranded people made their way back to destroyed homes and devastated livelihoods, a familiar question reared its head once more: How can we reduce the impacts of disaster?
While floods have dominated the headlines in Asia, large tracts of sub-Saharan Africa continue to be blighted by chronic drought, hunger and HIV/AIDS. Between August 2004 and January 2005, the World Food Programme aims to feed 1.8 million people in Kenya alone who are considered “highly food insecure�.
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