Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2006-06-12-Speech-1-157"
| Predicate | Value (sorted: default) |
|---|---|
| rdf:type | |
| dcterms:Date | |
| dcterms:Is Part Of | |
| dcterms:Language | |
| lpv:document identification number |
"en.20060612.20.1-157"2
|
| lpv:hasSubsequent | |
| lpv:speaker | |
| lpv:spokenAs | |
| lpv:translated text |
"Mr President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, first of all I congratulate the rapporteur on this excellent report and thank the Commission for presenting this directive.
Together with Mr Seeber and other fellow Members, I visited some of the countries most affected by the flooding and we were able to observe the damage caused by the 2005 floods
. During our visit to Germany and Austria we listened to the people’s concerns, gathered suggestions from the regional authorities and observed examples of good practice in flood risk prevention and management. This contact with people on the ground was a very useful experience for us in drawing up our reports.
Natural disasters are tending to recur with increasing frequency and with growing intensity. They are no longer events that happen once a century; now they recur every four years or every other year and their consequences are increasingly tragic.
In Central Europe, for instance, in Bavaria, there was very severe flooding in 1999, 2002 and 2005. Already this year as well, thousands of people have had to abandon their homes and many factories have had to stop work, not only in Germany but also in other countries such as the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary and Austria. Some Member State governments have even declared a state of emergency in various regions, and there have already been victims to mourn.
Natural disasters regularly leave a trail of destruction and death. Cities flooded, houses destroyed, millions and millions of euros’ worth of damage, and severe social and environmental problems are some of the obvious consequences of flooding.
According to the World Health Organization, natural disasters kill hundreds of people every year. Mr Dimas said that we should be ambitious. Well, let us be ambitious in preventing disasters and creative in finding answers to questions like: What can we do to stop a natural phenomenon from turning into a disaster? What can we do to prevent all the loss of human life, the ecological disasters and the social and economic problems that result from natural disasters?
The United Nations Secretary-General, Kofi Annan, said in this respect that we have to move on from a culture of reaction to a culture of prevention, and there is proof that prevention brings results. If we compare the flooding in Bavaria in 2002 and 2005, we see that in 2002 there were hundreds of victims and considerable damage, whereas in 2005, even though the flooding was five times worse, there was 30% less damage."@en1
|
| lpv:unclassifiedMetadata |
Named graphs describing this resource:
The resource appears as object in 2 triples