Peshawar - To bring together experts and professionals to assess the policy gap to garner global collaborations for innovative solutions for effective in all aspects of disaster management, a daylong workshop held here at the University of Engineering & Technology (UET) Peshawar, on Monday.
The workshop on “Needs Gaps Analysis for National Disaster Preparedness and Response” organised in collaboration with National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA), Provincial Disaster Management Authority (PDMA) and UET Peshawar.
Director General PDMA Peshawar Jannat Gul said, “In order to create awareness on natural disasters, a unified response is needed with the help of academia, government and civil society.” He said tjhat we do not have data of our local wisdom that has to be gathered by our Public Section Institutions to find out real life solutions.
Vice Chancellor UET Peshawar Prof Dr Iftikhar Hussain said that the Department of Civil Engineering and EEC UET Peshawar worked with NDMA in the revision of seismic building code 2021 and helped the department towards developing seismic hazard map. He said in recent years we have witnessed the severe consequences of floods, earthquakes and climate change which call for a unified response for mitigation and response for devising disaster management strategies. The VC appreciated the efforts of Prof Dr Rawid Khan, UET Peshawar for arranging the workshop.
Earlier, Prof Dr Khan Shahzada, Department of Civil Engineering, gave away a detailed presentation on UET Peshawar’s role in disaster preparedness and response.
Dr Fazal Ahmad Khalid, Rector GIK, Swabi urged for exploiting AI based solutions to deal with such challenges and create more awareness for policy making and engage academia to find out AI based solutions for a quick response and mitigate risks involved in Pakistan and the across the world.He stressed to have a reliable data collection mechanism where universities are central to work on this area.
He said, “Our graduates in the field hold more importance besides technology to suggest sustainable solutions.” He urged to start a joint degree programme in the field of disaster management and UET Peshawar needs to be at the central place in offering the same programme where policy level recommendations to the government. Dr Tayyab Shah, Manager Risk Assessment NDMA, Islamabad also spoke on the occasion.
