Carol Nguyen
Laguna Hills High School MUN Conference XIV
Economic and Social Council
Republic of Iceland
International Strategy for Disaster Reduction (ISDR)
Position Paper
PART 1: COUNTRY PROFILE
PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY
1. Republic of Iceland
2. temperate; moderated by North Atlantic Current; mild, windy winters; damp, cool summers
3.
a. absolute: 65 00 N, 18 00 W
relative: Northern Europe, island between the Greenland Sea and the North Atlantic Ocean, northwest of the UK
b. Hekla, Helgafell, Laki and Surtsey volcanoes, mostly plateau interspersed with mountain peaks, icefields; coast deeply indented by bays and fiords
c. 103,000 sq km
POLITICAL GEOGRAPHY
4. type of government: constitutional republic
names of government officials: President Olafur Ragnar GRIMSSON, Prime Minister Geir H. HAARDE
political parties: Independence Party or IP; Left-Green Movement or LGM; Liberal Party or LP; Progressive Party or PP; Social Democratic Alliance (includes People's Alliance or PA, Social Democratic Party or SDP, Women's List) or SDA
5. Reykjavik
6. Arctic Council, Australia Group, BIS, CBSS, CE, EAPC, EBRD, EFTA, FAO, IAEA, IBRD, ICAO, ICC, ICCt, ICFTU, ICRM, IDA, IFAD, IFC, IFRCS, IHO, ILO, IMF, IMO, Interpol, IOC, IPU, ISO, ITU, MIGA, NATO, NC, NEA, NIB, OECD, OPCW, OSCE, PCA, UN, UNCTAD, UNESCO, UPU, WCO, WEU (associate), WHO, WIPO, WMO, WTO
7. 69,038
CULTURAL GEOGRAPHY
8. official language: Icelandic
other languages spoken: English, Nordic languages, German widely spoken
ethnic composition: homogeneous mixture of descendants of Norse and Celts 94%, population of foreign origin 6%
major religions: Lutheran Church of Iceland 85.5%, Reykjavik Free Church 2.1%, Roman Catholic Church 2%, Hafnarfjorour Free Church 1.5%, other Christian 2.7%, other or unspecified 3.8%, unaffiliated 2.4%
9. population: 299,388
population growth rate: 0.87%
population distribution: urban: 93%, rural: 7%
10. Kópavogur, Hafnarfjördur, Akureyri
11. infant mortality rate: 3.29 deaths/1,000 live births
average life expectancy: 80.31 years
ECONOMIC GEOGRAPHY
13. $35,700
14. 0.07%
15. fish, hydropower, geothermal power, diatomite
16. agricultural: potatoes, green vegetables; mutton, dairy products; fish
industrial: fish processing; aluminum smelting, ferrosilicon production; geothermal power, tourism
17. exports: fish and fish products 70%, aluminum, animal products, ferrosilicon, diatomite
imports: machinery and equipment, petroleum products, foodstuffs, textiles
18. currency: Icelandic krona
exchange rate: 62.982
19. exports: $3.215 billion
imports: $4.582 billion
20. 1980: Vigdis Finnbogadottir becomes first woman president of Iceland.
1985: Iceland declares itself a nuclear-free zone.
1991: David Oddsson elected prime minister.
1992: Iceland leaves IWC (International Whaling Commission) in protest at what it sees as the IWC’s anti-whaling stance.
1996: Olafur Ragnar Grimsson elected president.
2001: Iceland applies to rejoin IWC but is granted only observer status because, after a gap of 12 years, it says it has plans to resume commercial whale hunting despite an IWC moratorium.
2002: IWC votes by narrow margin to readmit Iceland as a full member, despite the country’s plans to resume hunting for what it terms research in the near future and limited commercial hunting after 2006.
2003: David Oddsson continues as prime minister in coalition government following elections.
2004: Olafur Ragnar Grimsson re-elected president.
2006: Prime Minister Halldor Asgrimsson resigns after his party’s poor performance in local elections and amid concerns about the economy. He is succeeded by Geir Haarde.
https://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/geos/ic.html
http://www.intute.ac.uk/sciences/worldguide/html/911_map.html
http://www.tiscali.co.uk/reference/encyclopaedia/countryfacts/iceland.html
http://www.globalgeografia.com/europe_eng/iceland.htm
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/country_profiles/1025288.stm
PART 2: BACKGROUND OF TOPIC
The International Strategy for Disaster Reduction (ISDR) aids in creating an awareness of natural disasters, vulnerability, and risks in communities to decrease the number of death tolls, and economic and environmental losses that may happen during a disaster caused by natural hazards such as earthquakes, floods, landslides, drought, wildfires, tropical cyclones and associated storm surges, tsunami and volcanic eruptions. In order to increase public awareness, the ISDR builds on partnerships with the intention of gaining global support for the reduction of death tolls, and economic and environmental losses due to a natural disaster. Over the last three decades, disasters have been increasing in quantity and size because of more people being more vulnerable and having inadequate capacities to deal with these natural hazards. A disaster occurs only if a community or population is exposed to the natural hazard and is not able to cope with it effects. The key signs of a disaster happening in vulnerable areas are growing poverty, environmental degradation, populations crowed in risky locations, civil strife, and lack of knowledge and preparedness. The ISDR believes that the more individuals, UN organs, communities, governments, and other organizations that are aware of the capabilities of a natural hazard means more measures and precautions will be carried out in order to prevent losses from disasters. To get more people involved with the reduction of natural hazard disasters, the ISDR works with a program called the Platform for the Promotion of Early Warning (PPEW). The PPEW’s main goal is to reduce the increasing impacts of natural disasters by developing early warning systems. These early warning systems warn communities about the conditions that lead to disasters. The idea of how the natural hazard behaves, whether it is a storm of a locust swarm, a landslide, epidemic, a migration of people, or the slow destruction of a forest, is the main basis of all warning systems. To add to the process of disaster reduction, the ISDR has made up the International Day for Disaster Reduction. This day launches a global debate on how microfinance can reduce the impact of natural disasters in vulnerable communities. Brought up in this convention is the topic of Microcredit. Microcredit is a useful tool for poverty reduction, but its potential should be further explored in order to reduce the impact of disasters. Those most vulnerable to nature’s wrath are usually the poorest, which means that when we reduce poverty, we also reduce vulnerability. In conclusion, for the ISDR to decrease the impacts of natural disasters, we need everyone’s help to reduce vulnerability in communities, which also helps to reduce poverty.
PART 3: UNITED NATIONS INVOLVEMENT
There are two major programs developed by the UN that helps with the damage that the natural disasters cause to communities. The World Meteorological Organization (WMO) is one of the programs of the UN. The Natural Disaster Prevention Mitigation (DPM) is another programs established by the UN, which was developed by the WMO. The WMO works to find solutions to the problems presented by the weather. The DPM works to prevent the death tolls, and economic and environmental losses that occur during natural hazards. The PPEW, developed by the ISDR, works with the WMO to develop the early warning systems as well as the increase of the community response and emergency response to the natural disasters. During the World Conference on Disaster Reduction, the WMO added to the many ideas given about the Hyogo Declarations. In order to increase the speed of aid to the victims of the natural disasters such as tsunamis and the very recent Hurricane Katrina, the UN must bring together all of the branches and programs that they have developed in the past years to help fund the materials and to ensure the safety of the distraught, unfortunate victims.
PART 4: YOUR COUNTRY’S POLICY AND ACTIONS
Iceland is like any other country in the world. Iceland has many natural disasters, but they do not have them as often, and the natural disasters are not as hazardous. The natural disasters that Iceland has are earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, avalanches, and violent storms. Iceland has programs, which helps the community plan and react for such events. Iceland’s National Civil Defense Agency is Iceland’s personal program established by the government. Iceland’s National Civil Defense Agency works with the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). For the UN’s ECOSOC branch, Iceland does its part by working with partner countries to make sure that ECOSOC is doing everything in its power to help less fortunate countries. Iceland is a country that does not have scores of severe or major natural disasters, therefore Iceland does everything in its power to help the UN as well has other neighboring countries that are prone to severe and major natural disasters. Iceland has almost the same problem as many other countries. They suffer from some main difficulties in risk management. Fortunately, when the Icelanders see the problem, they quickly find a solution, which provides outstanding results. For example, with all of the steep mountains, they are obviously prone to avalanches. In addition, many towns are near the coast, at the bottom of the steep mountains. They quickly attacked this problem and ended up creating an avalanche monitoring system and evacuation program. This system and program are much like the early warning systems built by the PPEW of the ISDR. Fortunately, they also created the system and program at a moderately low cost. In Iceland, there are two UN programs. The United Nations University (UNU) Geothermal Training Programme and the UNU Fisheries Training Programme are the two UN programs located in Iceland.
http://www.mfa.is/speeches-and-articles/nr/2699
http://www.islandvulnerability.org/iceland.html#vulndisaster