Daily Times

ISLAMABAD – National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA) in collaboration with United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund (UNICEF)-Pakistan on Tuesday held first consultative dialogue to develop comprehensive school safety guidelines at national level.

The Gender and Child Cell of NDMA, with the support of the UNICEF was in the process of developing a set of national school safety policy guidelines to be used by public and private schools across the country in times of natural and man-made disasters.

NDMA Chairman Major General Asghar Nawaz stated that schoolchildren required special attention as they were among the most vulnerable segment during occurrence of disasters, according to a press release.

The purpose of school safety guidelines was establishment and training of a school disaster safety team, development of the school safety and security plan, awareness creation about possible disasters, analysis of the specific vulnerability and hazards of the school environment, evacuation routes and identified safe places, developing cooperation with the community and practical exercises and evacuation mock drills to enable the school community to be prepared and to act adequately to save lives in case of an emergency.

Participants from various organisations including the Pakistan Red Crescent, UN Habitat, IOM, WFP, Oxfam, UNESCO, Hope 87 and the Federal Ministry of Education attended the dialogue and gave objective inputs for the formulation of Guidelines.