Malawi is today hosting a high-level National Emergency Response Conference in Lilongwe, where participants will address the issue of the country’s readiness for disaster and its response.
The conference has been organised by the Adventist Development Relief Agency (Adra), in partnership with the Department of Disaster Management Affairs (Dodma) and the National Planning Commission.
Adra Country Director Dennis Matekenya said in Lilongwe that the aim of the conference is to spark dialogue on issues of disaster response.
He said participants will review issues such as disaster preparedness, response and resilience planning.
Matekenya further said stakeholders from the public sector, civil society, community leaders and key actors will share experiences.
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“The conference will also reflect on economic architecture that reduces the impact of natural disasters, bounce back quicker and demonstrate effective resilience,” Matekenya said.
He said the conference will feed into, and inform, the Dodma-facilitated Post Disaster Review Conference slated July 2023.
NPC Head of Research Andrew Jamali said the conference is crucial in shaping Malawi’s future as the country continues to soldier on on the road to 2063.
According to Jamali, over the past years, Malawi has encountered a number of shocks such as cyclones and that chances are high that such occurrences would continue moving into the future.
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“We, as Malawi, are talking about moving towards lower middle income economy status by 2030. And our progression towards that, since we started operationalising the vision of a wealthy and safe reliant nation towards 2063, has been punctuated by all these unforeseeable circumstances and events.
“We are talking about Cyclone Freddy of recent but, before that, we had the Gombes, Anas and so many others. In this trajectory of growth that we are talking about, these have the potential to derail interventions that are underway to help us graduate to a middle income economy,” Jamali said.
Dodma Deputy Director of Response for Resilience Hastings Mwanjoka said the conference will help Malawi reflect on shocks the country has experienced such as cyclones, Covid, cholera and the war in Ukraine.
