Emerging geo-information technologies (GIT) for natural disaster management in Pakistan: an overview

Geo-information Technologies (GIT) are playing a significant role for an efficient management of natural disasters all over the world. Among them space technologies are prominent for geo-information acquisition in an efficient and timely manner. This paper is focused on the potential uses of GIT for natural disaster management with particular examples in Pakistan which is vulnerable to various natural hazards and disasters, such as droughts, floods, earthquakes, landslides, cyclones etc; are causing a devastating impact on human life, economy and environment. The GIT includes Remote Sensing (RS), Geographical Information Systems (GIS), GPS, Information and Communication Technology (ICT) etc. The use of remote sensing and GIS has become an integrated, well developed and successful tool in disaster management. Spatial analysis of hazard is a complex task, as a number of factors play important role in the occurrence of the disastrous event. Therefore, analysis requires a large number of input parameters for pre-disaster, disaster and post-disaster phases. The increased availability of Remote Sensing data and GIS functionalities in these times have created opportunities for a more detailed and rapid analysis of natural hazards. These enabling technologies are also the core of comprehensive natural disaster management system that covers disaster's monitoring, modeling, mitigation, rescues operation management, and rehabilitation strategies development etc. It is almost impossible to fully control the disasters, but a suitable strategy can be developed for disasters management using GIT in conjunction with conventional techniques. Numerous projects have been initiated in the country for these purposes. The proper structure of information system for disaster management should be available to tackle the disaster and to integrate all the data sets in all such projects.