Jiang said he will ask telecommunications operators for assistance to disseminate real-time information quickly on any pending disaster via text message to alert people to danger.
The initiative is patterned after the Japanese government`s usage of the same method to alert residents in Tokyo of a looming disaster prior to the arrival of a powerful earthquake centered off the northeastern coast of its main island Honshu on March 11.
Rescue efforts after a disaster are usually difficult and their effect limited, Jiang said, and he therefore believed that people should be given enough knowledge and use their sound judgment to adopt the best strategy to protect themselves in emergencies.
Jiang, in his capacity as the deputy chairman of the National Disasters Prevention and Protection Commission, was reporting on contingency measures in case of an earthquake, fire, tsunami or nuclear accident at a legislative committee meeting.
Speaking on the same occasion, Coast Guard Administration Minister Wang Ginn-wang worried that the time to cope with a tsunami was very short and said he will invite related agencies for a meeting March 21 to discuss substantive strategies and procedures concerning sea rescue operations.
The legislative committee invited them to deliver briefings on the government`s contingency measures in the wake of last Friday`s magnitude 9.0 earthquake and ensuing tsunami in Japan.
(U.KR-IFB/F001)
Editor: Priyambodo RH
Copyright © ANTARA 2011
