Natural disasters――typhoons, hurricanes, cyclones, forest fires, landslides, mudslides, eruptions, tornadoes, floods, earthquakes and tsunamis――may be occurring somewhere in the world at this very moment.
As they also occurred ten days ago, ten years ago, and ten centuries ago, natural disasters are inevitable anywhere in the world. Ten days later, ten years later, and ten centuries later, they may destroy millions of people’s lives and properties.
Given this situation, it is necessary that those affected by natural disasters hand down their experience to other people. Spreading the lessons learned from real experience to all corner of the world will serve a guideline in case of future disasters. I believe that this activity would be the first and fundamental step towards disaster prevention and mitigation, and recovery and reconstruction.
The Disaster Reduction Alliance（DRA）and Hyogo Prefectural Government of Japan held “the Disaster Reduction Forum 2004” on February 8, 2004, where they made a proposal to the international society on importance and effectiveness of “transferring lessons of catastrophic disasters”. On January 18, 2005, they held “the Disaster Reduction Forum 2005” in commemoration of tenth anniversary of the Great Hanshin Earthquake, attended by representatives from countries hit by natural disasters. A proposal was also made in this forum: We can reduce population that will be affected in the future natural disasters by transferring live lessons of catastrophic disasters from the affected people’s point of view. Later, the network of the attendants turned out to be “Transfer Live Lessons Network (TeLL-Net)”, which was officially established on January 20, 2006 in Kobe, Japan.
World’s preparedness for natural disasters is still quite fragile. It is the mission of TeLL-Net to mobilize each community’s effort to prevent disasters and build worldwide network by “transferring stories”. Through this activity we aim at enhancing citizens’ solidarity of all parts of the world.
November 2007
Ikuo Kobayashi
Secretary General of TeLL-Net
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