Disaster statistics tend to conceal realities which are much more dramatic than numbers can express.
The reality however, becomes painfully in our everyday work as Red Cross or Red Crescent Societies when we see more and more families who have lost everything. In my region, Hurricane Mitch set the country's development back by 20 years. In my country, Peru, the economic loss caused by disasters induced by the El Niño phenomenon came to five times the country's gross domestic product. We still need to know the real dimension of the impact of the earthquake and tsunami in Asia.
In other words, decades of development can be destroyed by a disaster in a matter of hours. It is perhaps important to think about the reasons for such destruction. Paramount among these factors, certainly, is the implementation of development policies which ignore a key element - risk. As I said, disaster statistics do not tell the whole story, but the fact remains that the figures presented during this conference are undeniable evidence that disasters pose a development problem.
Of course, the effects of disasters have a disproportionate impact on developing countries, which lack the means to prevent or reduce risks, where the poorest are forced to live in the most dangerous areas, where they use farming methods which damage the environment and cause deforestation, where they have less access to information, education and basic services, where finally individual and collective security is not fully assured and, ultimately, families' means of support are precarious.
Yet, natural disasters also affect developed countries. The floods in Europe and the hurricane season in the Caribbean and the United States, the cyclones in the Pacific and earthquakes in Japan are recent examples.
Moreover, development can itself aggravate the effects of disasters when inappropriate urban planning does not take account of risks, is not governed by strict building regulations and does not take into account the environmental impact of uncontrolled growth. Poor development can even be the architect of so-called technological disasters. Thus, considering how to reduce risks must be a concern for everyone.
For all these reasons, we cannot consider disasters as isolated events which affect countries' progress. We must recognize that vulnerability to disasters is determined by a complex combination of physical, environmental, economic, political and social factors.
For many years, in the International Federation and its member National Societies, have concentrated our efforts on developing a better and more coordinated response and we have made huge strides in disaster preparation, especially at community level, where we are strongly represented through our wide network of volunteers. We have also been working on preparedness tools to improve the effectiveness of global disaster response efforts - both in terms of improving operational capacity as well as strengthening legal and policy frameworks.
However, we are aware that preparedness is not enough. We believe that the challenge disasters pose to governments as well as the Red Cross and Red Crescent as an auxiliary to public authorities, means that we must be able to work on all aspects of risk reduction. Prevention, preparedness and mitigation cannot be done in isolation - we must work together.
For this, coordination and collaboration by the various actors is crucial, especially work with and by social organizations at local or community level. This must be our challenge, our real humanitarian work, which will save lives and protect livelihoods, without seriously compromising the process of development and protection of human dignity.
Working to reduce risks means developing regulatory measures which include risk reduction at international, national, regional and local levels, in plans, policies, legislation, programmes and strategies. It also means promoting education and awareness raising activities, executing actions for prevention and mitigation to complement disaster preparedness, establishing early warning systems, applying building codes strictly, concentrating especially on the most vulnerable populations. It also means working with communities to install a 'culture of preparedness', and create a sense of how each individual can contribute to improving the safety of his of her family and local community.
Ladies and gentlemen, to invest in risk reduction is to invest in countries' development. It is, of course, less visible than disaster response and emergency humanitarian aid. However, investing in reducing vulnerability to disasters has the benefit of yielding big long-term dividends in the social, economic and political context.
From this platform, I wish to invite you when you go back to your own countries to include the disaster risk variable in your cost-benefit analyses. This will allow you, will allow us, to assess the true scale of the benefits of the task of reducing risks and, ultimately, sustainable development.
In the International Federation, we believe that we must look beyond the vision of the 'disaster to development' continuum and view the process from 'disaster vulnerability to development'.
This does not, of course, mean that we must place less emphasis on response. Quite the contrary. We must ensure that we are ready to respond effectively when disasters hit, but also do our best before the disaster to reduce our risk of being affected. Disaster management must take into account not only the need to alleviate the immediate suffering, but also the long-term effects of disasters.
Responses to disaster, whether they are local, national or international, should aim to strengthen community capacities, identify and reduce future vulnerability and support, rather than undermine, development objectives.
In conclusion, I would like to quote the words of the famous Latin-American writer Gabriel García Márquez when he received the Nobel Prize for Literature.
He envisaged: "A new and sweeping utopia of life, where no one will be able to decide for others how they die, where love will prove true and happiness be possible, and where the races condemned to one hundred years of solitude will have, at last and forever, a second opportunity on earth." The poor deserve a second opportunity.
I deeply hope that the results we achieve during this Conference will be positive and quickly bring about a serious commitment to work together.