Disaster risk management and role of Pakistan's corporate sector

Disasters, both natural and manmade, of colossal proportions have continued to beleaguer Pakistan especially over the last 3 decades. Response of the government agencies and that of the general community has improved with time but still can be best described as “reactive”. In the aftermath of the devastating 2005 earthquake corporate sector played its role as a key partner in disaster management. However, corporate sectors role has always been limited to contributions in the post disaster management efforts. The corporate sector possesses huge resources- human, material, technical and financial - and has significant presence in every region of the country. If effectively planned and encouraged the corporate sector can play a significant role in all the three phases i.e. Pre-disaster, disaster and post-disaster. This paper focuses on approaches executives can take to join forces with the relief organizations. A holistic strategy has been devised, that provides an effective framework of cooperation between the corporate sector and disaster management agencies for dealing with all the three disaster management phases. The study consists of discussions with the team leaders and members of disaster management agencies along with representatives of the corporate sector who had been actively involved in coordinating relief activities. Three major areas of public-private cooperation and partnership decisions have been identified over the life cycle of disaster management process i.e. awareness generation, disaster preparedness and mitigation planning for better disaster management.