Some 20 members of the Dumaguete tri-media completed on Tuesday a disaster preparedness orientation hosted by Smart Communications, Inc., held at a local hotel here.
The activity is part of Smart’s Tropang Ready Disaster Preparedness Caravan, originally a series designed for campus tours to prepare and educate the youth on disaster readiness and to strengthen their disaster resilience.
However, following the recent massive flooding in Dumaguete City and nearby towns, PLDT’s wireless subsidiary, Smart Communications, decided to also provide the same orientation for the local media, said Atty. Ma. Jane Paredes, head of Public Affairs for the Visayas-Mindanao areas.
“This is really a mini-orientation on disaster preparedness and we chose Dumaguete media because lately it is the scene of natural calamities and just last week, there was severe flooding that had caused substantial damage”, she said.
The flooding last week, although with zero casualty in Dumaguete, had resulted in the destruction of two spillways as well as affecting hundreds of families living near the riverbanks who had to be evacuated to higher ground.
Unprecedented heavy rains that lasted for several hours, believed to be worse than that of typhoon Sendong, inundated Dumaguete and other parts of Negros Oriental, and caused landslides in Valencia as well.
“It is crucial that media are also kept aware of how to respond to disasters because you are in a very critical position to disseminate information not only to your families but to your audiences as well”, said Atty. Paredes.
So it is only proper and fitting for the for the media to be oriented on disaster preparedness, to include broadcast, print and social media platforms, she added.
Nova Concepcion, Senior Manager for Disaster Preparedness, explained about Tropang Ready information caravan on disaster preparedness for the schools and which aims to “integrate disaster management into the school curriculum”.
They already had seven Tropang Ready caravan activities done across the country, although there is no scheduled date yet for this year but they are hoping that next year, they will be able to hold one activity in one of the universities here, Concepcion said.
This is also part of their integrated campaign on disaster preparedness, dubbed SafePH, a Corporate Social Responsibility program of Smart Communications, she added.
On the commercial side, they have launched ReadyPH which covers their products, services and solutions for local government units in terms of safety and security, Concepcion revealed.
The disaster preparedness orientation included lectures on basic/practical survival skills, tips on how foil a potential attacker and what essentials to carry in a survival kit, among others.
Louie Domingo of the Emergency Management Center, Inc. was the primary resource person in the disaster readiness orientation. (Judy Flores Partlow/PNA)