Having launched an emergency-response administrative office on
Tuesday, this coastal province in south China is now setting its
sights on drawing up a province-wide emergency-response plan, said
a top government official of Guangdong.
The office will be entrusted with coping with potential public
emergencies.
The office will mainly be responsible for reporting serious
foreign and domestic incidents, managing emergency situations,
coordinating response plans and otherwise handling public
assistance.
"As a coastal province, Guangdong has seen its share of public
incidents, including natural disasters and epidemic diseases, in
recent years. So it is essential that we set up a central office
and a scheme to cope with such incidents," Guangdong Governor Huang Huahua said.
Huang said geological disasters caused about 500 casualties
between 2002 and the end of last year and resulted in direct
economic losses of about 2 billion yuan (US$256 million).
"Having a comprehensive emergency-response plan will allow us to
predict and handle any kind of potential public emergency. Our
scheme will cover all county-level areas in the province this
year," Huang was quoted as saying by the Guangzhou-based
Yangcheng Evening News yesterday.
Huang said Guangdong had registered more than 90,000 plans aimed
at coping with various public incidents last year, ranging from
natural disasters, workplace incidents and public health disasters
to security issues.
"First, we will not allow any delays in the release of
information about such incidents to the public. The goal is to make
sure people know how to cope with them rather than keeping them
uninformed about what is happening around them," Huang said.
Huang also said Guangdong will set up a province-wide database
of information from rescue experts and coordinated response plans
to allow for the timely management of public disasters.
"A comprehensive command platform will also be set up to allow
officials and experts from the emergency-response office to be
present at the scene when incidents occur," Huang said.
In another development, Guangdong will also organize a series of
drills targeting terrorist attacks, serious animal-related
diseases, earthquakes, floods, geological disasters, nuclear
incidents, traffic accidents in subways and airplane crashes.
Meanwhile, another emergency response office was also set up
early last month in Guangzhou, the provincial capital.
Sources with the Guangzhou office said they were drafting a
local contingency plan for public accidents and would release a
completed version at the end of this year.
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(China Daily May 10, 2007)