ral production and living facilities, the provision of health services; the creation of cultural, sporting and other public service facilities; the strengthening of disaster prevention and relief systems; the restoration of the ecological landscape; and the provision of psychological support of the affected population.
Most importantly, the government was able to capitalize on the opportunities presented by this disaster to plan the reconstruction in a way that allowed the affected provinces to move forward.
Another interesting part of the reconstruction was the way other provincial governments and the population at large got involved.
Overall, about 41,130 projects for reconstruction and rehabilitation were undertaken, 99% of which were completed within a two year period. This was largely made possible thanks to the innovative measures such as a partnership scheme set up among provinces – basically, the Central Government paired up each affected county with an unaffected province, which then worked to provide financial and technical assistance for reconstruction and restoration.
These provinces in turn worked to raise awareness among their population and industrial sectors of the needs of the affected provinces they were assisting. In this way, civil society was also massively mobilized. In total, over RMB 949 billion (US$ 146 billion) were invested for reconstruction.
Furthermore, the earthquake provided an opportunity to reconstruct all public-service facilities in the affected areas with high seismic standards and modern equipment. Some RMB108 billion (US$ 16.6 billion) were spent in these facilities, including investments in medical and sanitation facilities and social management. Schools and hospitals are now fully restored and reconstructed, in addition to social welfare houses, elderly homes, community service centers, village activity centers, etc.
We are continuing to strengthen our partnership with the Chinese government on disaster and risk mitigation and management, by disseminating China’s great experience and expertise in disaster preparedness and relief to other countries in the region and worldwide.
This Monday (May 14), the China Emergency Relief Training Center (CERT) in Beijing, with support from GFDRR, through the World Bank, is offering the one-week Emergency Response and Relief Training to selected rescue teams from Indonesia, a country that has also been hit hard by natural disasters. This training is designed to prepare medical and rescue teams to respond to emergencies more effectively in future.
We hope that this will be the first of a series of such trainings through which China can share some of the know-how it has acquired from previous disasters such as the 08 earthquake.
Here, watch a video that records a training program on disaster preparedness for primary and second school teachers from the Sichuan earthquake-struck areas: