PORTALJABAR, BANDUNG CITY - The National Disaster Management Agency (BNPB) held the 2024 National Disaster Management Coordination Meeting (Rakornas PB). This annual event took place in Bandung City, West Java, opened by Vice President (Wapres) Ma'ruf Amin.

Head of BNPB Lt. Gen. TNI Suharyanto reported that future disaster challenges are increasingly complex. The impact of climate change is increasingly felt and makes the impact of disasters more significant.

Suharyanto said that alignment between strategy and policy must be supported by innovation and technology that enable rapid response. This will be able to answer planning challenges to anticipate, prevent and build preparedness.

Apart from that, Suharyanto also underlined that the innovation and technology designed will be able to support the early action ecosystem at the community level.

"Facts on the ground show that the emergency response phase will be more effective if it is supported by the availability of sufficient logistics and equipment, so that the emergency transition and rehabilitation and reconstruction phases can be accelerated," said Suharyanto, Wednesday (24/4/2024).

In the opening report, the Head of BNPB also presented disaster data. According to him, the number of disaster events in 2023 is greater than the previous year. However, Suharyanto emphasized, in terms of impact, this shows a significant downward trend, especially in the last three years.

"The number of victims affected, injured and killed in 2023 decreased by 36 percent from 9,628 people in 2022 to 6,081 people in 2023. Likewise, the number of infrastructure damage due to disasters was 97,891 units in 2022, down to 35,933 units in 2023, or a decrease of 63 percent," he said.

The 2024 PB National Coordination Meeting is a means of coordination between BNPB and BPBD as well as related work partners at the central and regional levels, of course in implementing disaster management.

Through this national activity, BNPB hopes that the 2024 National Coordination Meeting will aim to (1) identify challenges and evaluate the achievements of disaster management programs, (2) internalize and harmonize disaster management program plans at the national-provincial and district/city levels, (3) prepare BNPB policy recommendations and BPBD this year, as well as (4) opening up broader insight into technology and innovation in disasters.

The activity, which took place on 23 – 24 April 2024 , was attended by participants from the pentahelix elements, including representatives of ministries and institutions, DPR-RI, ambassadors from friendly countries, regional heads, provincial BPBDs, leadership elements of the TNI, Polri, district or city BPBDs, academics , practitioners, representatives of the business world, media and community organizations.