Rescue efforts in tsunami-hit Palu city(Photo: Xinhua/VNA)
Jakarta (VNA) – Spokesman of the Indonesian National DisasterManagement Agency Sutopo Purwo Nurgroho said on October 28 that the reconstructionand rehabilitation programme following the disastrous quakes and tsunami willbegin next month.
The country will need more than 10 trillion rupiah (657 million USD) to carryout the two-year programme, he added.
The same day,Indonesian authority put the casualty of the catastrophe in Central Sulawesiprovince at 2,086, the number of injured people at 4,438, while financial lossratcheted up to 18.48 trillion rupiah (1.22 billion USD).
Nugroho said the downside risks on economy in the form of financial losses anddamages resulted from the quakes and tsunami are expected to rise as theassessments of the impacts have not been completed yet.
Palu capital of Central Sulawesi province is the hardest hit, followed by thedistrict of Sigi, Parigi Mountong and Donggala. Downpour on October 21triggered floods and landslides in Sigi, hampering rescue efforts in thedevastated areas.
Some 32.7 tonnes of relief aids have been channeled to the survivors there.
Earlier, the 6.0-, 7.4- and 6.1-magnitude quakes followed by a tsunami by up to3 metres on September 28 have destroyed 68,451 houses, 327 religious buildings,and 7 bridges, and cracked roads in 168 areas.
The Indonesian Government is planning to build a new city as alternate to Palucity as it is impossible to re-construct the city on the previous ground. Duyu,Pondok and Pembewe are three locations being considered.
Indonesia is frequently struck by earthquakes, volcanic eruptions and tsunamisbecause of its location on the "Ring of Fire", an arc of volcanoesand fault lines in the Pacific Basin.
A series of earthquakes in July and August killed nearly 500 people on theholiday island of Lombok, hundreds of kilometres southwest of Sulawesi.
In 2004, a substantial earthquake off the northern Indonesian island of Sumatratriggered a tsunami across the Indian Ocean, killing 220,000 people in 13countries, including more than 168,000 in Indonesia.-VNA
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