OVER the past few weeks, we have been busying ourselves in several projects that have really brought together, not only communities and stakeholders but also nations, businesses and investment opportunities.
Just recently one of our proudest endeavors has been successfully launching Ethiopian Airlines’s inaugural flights to the Philippines. The milestone paved the way for both the Philippines and Africa to link together strategically to help strengthen trade and investment ties between Asia and Africa. Apart from this, it has also made the Philippines the 91st destination of Ethiopian Airlines, one of the largest and fastest-growing airlines in the world.
Working with global companies and institutions like Ethiopian Airlines and the Ethiopia Embassy in Manila is a really thrilling experience for all of us at GeiserMaclang. Thinking about the impact and the magnitude of the kind of work we fulfill in the course of partnering with them really makes us beam with pride and honor.
And so, after weeks of being immersed in projects like this, I’ve had the opportunity to once again update myself on some other developments happening both in the region and around the world. One particular story that really caught my interest this past week was about the uncertain future gripping Thailand’s capital—Bangkok—as of the moment.
Sounding the alarm
For years, Thailand’s disaster experts have been warning the government about the rapid rate Bangkok is sinking into the Earth. “Thailand’s capital is both glitzy and gritty, a city of glass towers and cement hovels teeming with nearly 10 million people. All that steel and concrete and humanity sits on what was once marshland. The ground beneath is spongy and moist,” wrote Patrick Winn of the GlobalPost, as published on Business Insider. “Imagine a brick resting on top of a birthday cake. That’s Bangkok—and it’s sinking into the Earth at an alarming rate.”
Numerous studies conducted by experts and other relevant agencies have revealed that Bangkok has been sinking by more than 3 inches per year. Other more recent estimates, however, suggest that the rate is happening a lot faster at 4 inches per year. Apart from this, some disaster experts have also been quoted as saying that, if nothing is done immediately to address global warming and the coming calamity, city dwellers and businesses may find themselves under 5 feet of water come 2030. At the rate things are going, disaster specialists are predicting that Bangkok may become virtually unlivable in about 50 years’ time.
Keeping priorities on point
Bangkok’s situation certainly mirrors the growing apprehension among Filipino urban dwellers and property developers, as well.
The grim future facing Bangkok only points out the fact that nothing can withstand the power of nature. Filipinos can relate to this kind of wariness, especially now that disaster experts have been continuously warning about the possibility of the country suffering from a massive earthquake in the near future—one that can reduce a huge portion of Metro Manila to rubbles, if nothing is done to promote disaster and risk-reduction measures the soonest time possible. Land values, property rates, sales uptakes and occupancy rates may be at an all-time high during the past few years, but all these figures and projections can be rendered worthless unless relevant institutions from both the public and the private sector come up with an efficient framework to mitigate the impact of a calamity as big as what experts have been predicting.
Recently the Philippine Institute of Volcanology and Seismology (Phivolcs) has released the new Valley Fault System Atlas, a mapping mechanism that can help local governments, businesses and citizens alike minimize the impact of a possible massive earthquake to lives and properties. Using information from the new atlas, property developers and relevant government agencies can now plan ahead and strengthen their risk reduction and disaster-management initiatives. The government has begun evaluating which among Metro Manila’s towering urban structures need to be reinforced or, if nothing else is left to do, brought down. Real-estate developers are also continuing to build high-performance buildings and microdistricts that will be able to handle the impact of any devastating calamity. As I have learned from my past collaborations with urban planners and other disaster experts, developers should feel responsible in building communities that don’t stop working with every earthquake or calamity. The role of developers lies in being sensitive to total disaster preparedness and life and business continuity strategies. It is about pushing for innovations with the goal of making sure that individual communities exist with proper preparedness in mind.
The key to promoting efficient disaster risk-reduction measures is to overcommunicate and overprepare. The only way to really be able to help preserve lives and ensure businesses would not cease to exist is to overdo preparations, and it all starts by helping raise awareness toward a culture of preparedness and resilience.