Presidential Spokesperson Anthony Golez said the resources and manpower in the region in terms of disaster management is not sufficient, so he is encouraging the people and non-government organizations to get involved with disaster response or any aspect of its management.

Golez, together with Presidential Assistant for Western Visayas Raul Banias, was among the resource speakers at the Collapsed Structure Search and Rescue pilot test refresher course conducted at the Bacolod City Government Center recently.

The training sponsored by the Office of the National Civil Defense and the City of Bacolod, aims at sharing the best practices of other countries to local rescue groups in terms of disaster management. It was attended by experts from Nepal, Bangladesh and Indonesia.

However, Golez said they are thankful that the leadership of both the Province of Negros Occidental and the City of Bacolod are very helpful in trying to beef up their disaster response activities.

Asked how prepared is Bacolod in terms of disaster preparedness, Golez said ”We are more prepared now than yesterday and in terms of equipment, we can say it is slowly beefing up.”

He said that, sooner or later, the national government will help the different regions in terms of equipment and Bacolod will be one of the recipients.

Golez said that in order to improve, the people should be educated on how to arm themselves with the knowledge of what to do before disasters like typhoons or earthquake, strike.

There is also a need for a very efficient response team and support of the national and local government officials, he said.

Golez said all the experts on Collapsed Structure, Search and Rescue came to train local rescue groups in the seminar so that in case of disasters, the city can immediately respond to the needs of the people.

Meanwhile, Banias said there are many volunteer organizations in Bacolod and in the province that are very competent in rescue and disaster program, and that even the local government units have training and capacity-building activities.

“Compared to other LGU’s in the region, I have observed that Bacolod is more equipped and ready to respond to disasters,” Banias said.

He also said he believes the training for CSSR is needed because there is a need to build up the capacity of the local rescue groups.

“This is timely and we are happy that we have peers coming from other countries to share their experiences, insights and skills with Bacolod and Negros Occidental,” he said.*CGS

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