Bracing for the new normal
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Tackling climate extremes
Can a country like Nepal deal with the unprecedented damage caused by extreme events? If the current circumstances continue, the answer is no. The financial limitation of a low-income country like ours cannot be overlooked, and we cannot always rely on foreign assistance to manage disasters. Climate finance and disaster risk reduction support from international partners is becoming increasingly uncertain due to global uncertainties and shifting geopolitics. This reality forces us to develop self-reliant strategies and action plans to tackle climate extremes and minimise future losses. To prevent economic, social, infrastructural, agricultural and food crises, we must recognise our present realities and plan accordingly.
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The National Policy on Disaster Risk Reduction, 2075, emphasises the importance of mainstreaming disaster risk reduction (DRR) across all sectors, including social, infrastructure, health, economic and environmental domains. However, the lack of clear implementation guidelines and sectoral urgency has hindered the effective translation of this policy into concrete actions on the ground. Nepal's disaster risk reduction approach has traditionally been more response-oriented, with insufficient emphasis on proactive preparedness, a shift that could significantly reduce the costs of response and recovery.
Similarly, our mitigation strategies for disasters such as floods and landslides have remained largely unchanged for decades, despite their limited sustainability, effectiveness and relevance in the face of evolving challenges. We must critically reassess and modernise the conventional methods used for river training, landslide control and other disaster mitigation to ensure they are contextually appropriate and resilient to future risks. Local knowledge has often been overlooked when developing mitigation plans for floods, landslides and other disasters. Nature-based solutions, which offer sustainable and cost-effective alternatives, have not received the attention they deserve, especially considering the high investment demands of traditional structural measures.
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The government alone cannot tackle the increasing disasters. So, there has to be a collaboration with NGOs, INGOs, universities, private institutions and community organisations on dealing with relevant components of disaster risk reduction such as awareness campaign, promoting local knowledge, research, etc. The current institutional structure, where the Ministry of Forests and Environment is assigned the leadership role in the climate change sector, lacks adequate coordination with key development infrastructure ministries (such as irrigation, energy and physical infrastructure). This may have contributed to the ambiguity in effectively integrating climate adaptation and disaster risk reduction into development planning. It is essential to establish a unified structure with clearly defined responsibilities that includes representation from all stakeholders involved in disaster risk reduction.
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