Preservation of Ecology in Disaster-Prone Areas Versus Humanitarian Relief Essay

Addressing problems related to natural disasters in disaster-prone areas has proved to be challenging the governments and people of the affected regions. The tragedy of hurricane Maria that swept across Porto Rico in 2017 has generated debate about the role of humanitarian relief in restoring the damage left after the occurrence of such disasters. In these circumstances, some have expressed the view that much more resources should be channeled into humanitarian assistance. Those who oppose this perspective, however, contend that directing a lot of funds towards the ecological conservation is the best strategy capable of addressing the social and economic problems for countries that are located in regions where natural disasters occur often. The lack of agreement on the issue raises questions on the best approach to dealing with the risks of disasters, especially in areas where such events are common. A careful analysis of both sides of the divide reveals that, although humanitarian relief is crucial in disaster-prone areas, more funding should be directed to the preservation of ecology as it offers a longer-term solution as opposed to humanitarian assistance.

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The effect of Hurricane Maria's 155-mph winds which passed through Puerto Rico was great. It made the Island desperate for humanitarian relief to save the victims of the incident. The disaster broke all the electric power and other cell phone services in the Island, and this renders more than 3.4 million people homeless. Humanitarian relief would be used to rescue the affected people by giving them shelter and food before the Island restore to its normal condition (Santos 104). Allocating some reasonable funds for humanitarian relief purposes is necessary. The funds would be used to purchase food for those who had felt the effect of Hurricane Maria's winds and also to ensure the people get assistance from well-wishers. The storm forced thousands of people to flee from the Island. More than 269000 people fled to Florida from the Hurricane due to blackout, shortage of food and lack of clean drinking water. Other people were staying with their relatives while others relocated to the US and others waiting in hotels. There was a need for a reasonable proportion of funds for humanitarian relief to help the Island of Puerto Rico to restore electricity which was considered one of the biggest challenges affecting Puerto Rico (Santos 84). Without humanitarian assistance, the Island would have remained without power for a very long time which would have worsened the economy of Puerto Rico Island. For these reasons, it would be essential to demand more funds to go for humanitarian relief to rebuild what was destroyed by the winds. The receipt of the funds would help install new power which had not been restored since hurricane Maria.

Humanitarian relief should also receive a high amount of funds because it helps countries affected by disasters may be facing economic problems which cannot allow the leaders to set aside funds for relief efforts or conservation. For instance, the island of Puerto Rico had been experiencing economic recession even before hurricane Maria. The Government of Puerto Rico was broke and could support its financial activities neither offer help to those affected by the calamity. Under such situations, humanitarian relief funds should be top on priority to finance the power grid which had a problem before the storm. The public utility company had no money to repair the power plant. The receipt of humanitarian relief funds would help it solve its bankruptcy problems and also ensure it has enough human resource to restore the power plant (Santos 102). With the support of humanitarian relief funds, it would have the capacity to start repairing the grid. The funds would help in building and shipping utility poles, and power lines to the Island of Puerto Rico set them up on the hilly terrain for the utility crew. Without sufficient funding from humanitarian relief, the island would have experienced many problems in ensuring that essential utilities such as power lines and other resources are provided to run the economy which was already in tatters as a result of the devastating winds.

A considerable amount of money should be allocated to humanitarian relief as poor governance in high-risk countries can cause many deaths if this area is ignored. This implies there is no need to emphasize on ecological preservation when the leaders of high-risk nations do not even see it as a priority to help fellow citizens by allocating money for victims as well as funds that address the problems that arise in the wake of calamities such as hurricanes. For example, the weak relationship between Puerto Rico and the Federal Government made the latter respond slowly towards the crisis and regretted about the amount of money the crisis requires instead of passing condolence. This shows that the Federal Government did not see the need to help or support Puerto Ricans due to the poor relationship (Lugo 75). Furthermore, the president took several weeks insulting the mayor of San Juan when he accused the Federal Government of abandoning Puerto Rico. Because of poor relationship Puerto Rico had to depend on humanitarian relief funds to finance its disaster recovery operations. However, humanitarian relief is short-term and, therefore, does not address the root causes of problems in countries prone to disasters. This means that much of the effort in high-risk countries should focus on the long-term solutions hence the need for more funds should be channeled to initiatives that promote the long-term agenda of people that live in regions prone to disasters as in the case of Puerto Rico.

If the effects of disasters such as hurricanes are to be mitigated by reducing the number of people who die and property that gets destroyed during such occurrences, it is essential that more funding is directed to the preservation of ecology. This is meant to balance with the enormous amounts of resources that have been used on humanitarian aid for many years. Money allocated for ecological preservation represents a fraction of what countries and relief agencies have set aside for risk reduction. According to Kellett et al. many high-risk nations receive a significantly small amount of finances towards risk reduction efforts such as ecological preservation with 17 of the 24 top 20 beneficiaries of aid-receiving less than 4 percent of the disaster-related as the amount meant to risk reduction initiatives (5-10). This is very similar to the issue of Porto Rico. Before Hurricane Maria hit the island, few resources had been directed to ecological preservation. The response only focused on providing relief to the affected people, but little focus was given to measures that can reduce damage when such destructive events take place. Since the amount of money allocated for humanitarian relief has always been huge, it is time for the relevant persons to focus now on building long-term solutions and this can only be done through increased funding to efforts are meant to preserve the ecosystem.

More funds should be allocated to conservation and preservation of ecology because of the urgent need to prioritize on proactive disaster risk reduction than overreacting to disaster events. This condition made the Federal Government not to respond to the issue of Puerto Rico as expected from the public. It, therefore, found it more demanding to allocate more funds to the preservation of ecology as it can act as an approach for disaster risk reduction (Monty et al. 85). It would be better for a country to be more concerned about biodiversity in disaster risk reduction rather than responding to a disaster event which has occurred, and its consequences cannot be prevented. It is necessary to employ ecosystem-based approaches to mitigate risk against disasters such as what happened in Puerto Rico for the future initiative because it can bring long term responses to address the effect of the natural disaster. It is therefore essential to allocate more finances on a long-term effort than a short term which last for months or a year. The employment of such course of actions also acts as evidence that funding DRR contribute significantly to minimizing the number of funds required in responding to disaster events. The investment in environmental initiatives is also likely to reduce the impact of the disaster in risk-prone areas.

Funding for conservation efforts should be given more attention since politics often drive humanitarian relief. Politics is a critical factor that drives the number of funds received when there is a disaster. It is one of the barriers that motivate donors to finance recovery after disaster events. Politicians in areas where there is a disaster prefer receiving relief aid than investing in disaster reduction initiatives when there is a disaster event (Seck 1-5). Consequently, disaster relief gains a propensity to be overzealously funded while disaster risk reduction remains the poor cousin in development cooperation. As such, the best course of action that can help victims of a disaster is to invest more in preventive and mitigation programs such as conserving and preserving ecology. According to Seck, it is necessary to apply the same standards of entitlement to assistance because of shared humanity that form the crucial building block of humanitarian aid in times of disaster. Investing more money in relief and development efforts without considering the underlying vulnerabilities is an expensive way to do business since the next hazard will negate all the gains that were made, creating a cycle of relief, disaster, and relief again (3-7).

Putting more funds to conservation and preservation of ecology is also crucial in improving agricultural production which can, in turn, be used for the production of food for people affected by disasters. Investing more resources on disaster recovery will only bring short term solution to the problem but will not ensure that the people. After disasters strike, one of the challenges that people face is the lack of food and clean water. Although it is vital that emergency funds are provided to address immediate problems, giving priority more to the preservation of the ecosystems is essential for food production. For instance, fierce winds and flooding rains, the tropical forests were demolished with the remains washing away to the water bodies creating an ugly outlook. Nitrates in the stream showed a dramatic increase hence posing a danger to the aquatic life which is part of the tourist attraction (Spencer 30). Although regions are not suitable for agriculture, putting more funds in the conservation of ecology will improve the agricultural condition of high-risk countries by ensuring that there is sufficient water for agriculture, clean water for drinking and pleasant climate. This will be influenced by planting more trees, conserving forests and even protecting marine life.

Conclusion

Besides agriculture, more money should be used for the preservation of the ecosystem because some of the elements of the ecosystem form an integral part of many economies around the world. It is true that disaster aid in the form of relief is critical at the time the disaster takes place to help affected people rebuild their lives. However, making nature conducive for people to build their lives on their own is more important than giving supplying them with needs because the latter is not a sustainable way of dealing with problems of the economy. Reports on how disasters destroy investments show that spending money on the preservation of the ecosystem reduces pressures on the amount of money that goes to humanitarian as well as reduce the effects of disasters on communities and the economies(Kellett et al. 6-8). The incide...