Natural Disaster in Artik Resulting from Non-Assessment of Risks

The natural disaster occurred in Artik is the result of not assessing the risks. Reminder: on 24 June the houses and streets in Artik towns were flooded and filled with mud because of unprecedented precipitation.

Thus case proved that the decisions and programs adopted for the reduction and management of risks in Armenia are inefficient and the local self-government bodies, as a rule, don't take them into consideration when developing their development plans.

On 7 March 2012 the government adopted resolution 281-N 'On Approving National Strategy to Reduce Disaster Risks in Armenia and Action Plan on Implementation of National Strategy to Reduce Disaster Risks'. This strategy comes from the national security strategy of Armenia, which lays down the tasks of disaster risk reduction strategies and in this case the following causes are worth attention:

· To assess probable climate risks and to take measures aimed at their prevention and reduction of consequences at global, national and local levels.

· To acknowledge disaster and climate risk reduction and general management tasks as priorities through involving them in national and local development plans,

· To develop monitoring, prevention and early notification systems to detect disaster threats, to assess and control them,

· To develop and implement continuous programs aimed at building capacities in the communities related to disaster risk reduction,

· To develop and introduce disaster damage insurance system, which will not only promote compensation provision process and vulnerability reduction, but it will also become one of the strong mechanisms to gain financial resources.

One year after the adoption of this resolution four-year socio-economic development program for Artik community was approved for 2013-2019 years. The program doesn't include any point on risk management or reduction, including risks because of climate change. Flood notification system in Artik was the shepherd's phone call to the mayor, who said in one of his interviews that he didn't imagine about the extent of the flood. The disaster damage insurance system also doesn't work, which would exclude the current problems in regard to the state compensation extent given to Artik residents.

Reminder: in 2015 'Disaster Risk Management National Program' was launched in 2015, which was funded by the World Bank providing US $ 1.75 million. The objective of this program is to develop disaster risk resistance by improving disaster risk information, promoting disaster risk reduction, strengthening risk preparation and improving the perception of fiscal risks of disasters and risk financing versions.