How did Indonesia Capital handle disaster during disaster?

Jakarta, the capital city of Indonesia, has been suffered from annual floods due to its geographical and morphological area (Texier, 2008). In early 2021, the government of Jakarta was forced to handle the flood amidst the COVID-19 pandemic, while on the other side, the capital is the highest contributor to positive case numbers nationally (National Covid-19 Task Force, 2021). Even though there has been no scientific calculation on how both risks interact, it is not debatable that the pandemic amplifies the impact generated by the flood. For instance, people whose houses are flooded are more vulnerable to being infected by Covid-19 as they have a shortage of clean water and sanitation (Ishiwatari et al., 2020). Therefore, pandemic risk needs to be taken into account in flood risk management, those will bring Jakarta into a big catastrophe in the next pandemic.

Flood Risk Management

Generally, flood risk emerges from incorporating flood hazards, exposures and probability of consequences. According to Schanze (2006), a flood hazard can be defined as an event when land is covered by water outside the normal confines temporarily. The exposure of Jakarta floods takes place along the river basin, in urban areas, and in the coastal area. The probability of flood climbs during the rainy season, usually from September until March.

Overcoming flood risk should be addressed as a holistic and continuous effort, known as flood risk management. Flood risk management involves the decision-making of various stakeholders (e.g., water authority, spatial planning authority) and multiple levels (e.g., local, regional, national, international) (Schanze, 2006). The main goal of flood risk management is to minimize losses within a risk area. Flood risk management can be divided into activities within a timeframe, namely pre-flood intervention, flood-event management, and post-flood intervention (Kundzewicz and Samuel, 1997; Schanze, 2006)

Pre-flood interventions include prevention and mitigation, aim to decrease the magnitude of floods and vulnerable elements in flood-prone areas. For instance, the construction of physical flood defense infrastructure, creating green space and water absorption in land use planning, river normalization, and naturalization, as well as creating flood risk management regulation (Kundzewicz and Samuel, 1997). Flood event management covers monitoring weather, rainfall intensity, the water level in the sea and river, as well as generating flood warnings and evacuation orders (Kundzewicz and Samuel, 1997). Finally, post-flood interventions consist of recovery and reconstruction such as calculating damage and loss, aid for injured people, coverage of insurance, and a review of the existing flood risk management plan (Kundzewicz and Samuel, 1997).

Flood Risk Management Amidst Pandemic

The occurrence of a pandemic is not restricted by time and place, nor the presence of natural hazards (i.e., flood, earthquake, tsunami). To take into account the pandemic aspect of flood risk management, it is important to know the principles of pandemic risk management. Pandemic risk is driven by the spread of zoonotic sparks within a population and influenced by human population-level factors (such as the density of the population; movement pattern; and effectiveness of public health surveillance and response measures) (Fan et al., 2018).The principle of managing pandemic risk lies in maintaining health service capacity and preventing the spread of the virus (Baveja, 2020). In terms of the COVID-19 pandemic, many regulations have been applied in countries, including Indonesia, such as travel restrictions and mandatory use of face covering.

Some articles have been dedicated to exploring how the pandemic affects flood risk management at the country level (for China—Guo et al., 2020); Japan (Ishiwatari, et al., 2020), United States (Shen et al., 2021). Most articles note that the mandatory regulation of public activities due to the pandemic affects how disaster risk management is conducted, particularly in flood-event management. For instance, search and rescue in flood evacuation are more complicated when everyone is practising physical distancing. During an emergency evacuation, practising physical distancing might be nearly impossible.

Jakarta Flood Risk Management during the Pandemic

Greater Jakarta is geographically crossed with one big river, namely the Ciliwung River. Being situated in watershed consequently make Greater Jakarta exposed to hydro-meteorological risks, such as flood. Severe floods due to the Ciliwung River’s flow have been recorded in 1996, 2002, 2007, 2012, and 2013 (Dewi & Ast, 2017), while the most severe one took place in early 2020. As the downstream area, Jakarta experienced more severe floods compared to other regions. Many efforts have been carried out by the Dutch government and Indonesian governments, yet Jakarta cannot be entirely free from flooding as Jakarta is typical of the flood-prone area in the delta of major rivers (Asdak et al. 2018).

Due to its high risk of flood, it is imperative to review and modify the existing Jakarta flood risk management to ensure they are appropriate interventions in times of pandemics. It is not only about flood-event management, but also pre and post-flood intervention. For instance, in pre-flood intervention, does the spatial plan address fairly distributed green public spaces in each neighborhood? Availability of green spaces in urban areas are needed for run-off infiltration, but the distribution of green spaces is becoming more important when a pandemic emerges, since it will affect the local’s movement. In terms of flood event management, are the shelters and evacuation procedures conducted using health protocol? In terms of post-flood management, are hospitals adequate to accommodate injured people while at the same time treating Covid-19 cases?

In September 2020, Jakarta experienced the first flood event during the pandemic. While the Jakarta Disaster Management Office had not prepared a comprehensive flood risk management plan during a pandemic in advance, the government had anticipated the flood event with several measures such as setting adequate distance for each evacuee spot in the shelter, providing masks and hand sanitizers, conducting training for local sub-district leader to improve their flood preparedness and having health workers standby nearby shelter in case some evacuees had Covid-19 symptoms (Puspita, 2022). This was a good example on how local governments handle disaster during disaster, though they still need to formulate plans for pre-flood intervention and post-flood intervention during a pandemic to minimize affected people.

In conclusion, dealing with a flood is much more challenging when also struggling to flatten the pandemic curve since the COVID-19 pandemic worsens the flood’s impact. Thus, flood risk management must take into account pandemic risk management to avoid a double negative impact on the community.

References

Asdak, C., Supian, S., & Subiyanto. (2018). “Watershed management strategies for flood mitigation: A case study of Jakarta’s flooding.” Weather and Climate Extremes, 21, 117–122. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.wace.2018.08.002

Baveja, Alok. (2020). Stopping Covid-19_ A pandemic-management service value chain approach _ Enhanced Reader.pdf.

Dewi, B. R. K., & Ast, J. A. van. (2017). “Institutional arrangements for integrated flood management of the Ciliwung-Cisadane river basin, Jakarta Metropolitan Area, Indonesia. Urban Governance in the Realm of Complexity” Chapter 14 307–322. https://doi.org/10.3362/9781780449685.014

Fan, V. Y., Jamison, D. T., & Summers, L. H. (2018). Pandemic risk: How large are the expected losses? Bulletin of the World Health Organization, 96(2), 129–134. https://doi.org/10.2471/BLT.17.199588

Guo, Y., Wu, Y., Wen, B., Huang, W., Ju, K., Gao, Y., & Li, S. (2020). Floods in China, COVID-19, and climate change. The Lancet Planetary Health, 4(10), e443–e444. https://doi.org/10.1016/S2542-5196(20)30203-5

Ishiwatari, M., Koike, T., Hiroki, K., Toda, T., & Katsube, T. (2020). Managing disasters amid COVID-19 pandemic: Approaches of response to flood disasters. Progress in Disaster Science, 6, 100096. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.pdisas.2020.100096

Kundzewicz Z. and Samuels P.G. (1997) Real-time Flood Forecasting and Warning. Conclusions from Workshop and Expert Meeting. Proceedings of Second RIBAMOD Expert Meeting, Published by DG XII, European Commission, ISBN 92-828-6074-4.

Puspita, N. (2022). MITIGASI BANJIR PADA SAAT PANDEMI COVID 19: SUDAH SIAPKAH PEMERINTAH DKI JAKARTA?. JURNAL PENDIDIKAN KEWARGANEGARAAN UNDIKSHA

Schanze, J. (2006). FLOOD RISK MANAGEMENT – A BASIC FRAMEWORK. In J. Schanze, E. Zeman, & J. Marsalek (Eds.), Flood Risk Management: Hazards, Vulnerability and Mitigation Measures (Vol. 67, pp. 1–20). Springer Netherlands. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4020-4598-1_1

Shen, X., Cai, C., Yang, Q., Anagnostou, E. N., & Li, H. (2021). The US COVID-19 pandemic in the flood season. Science of The Total Environment, 755, 142634. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scitotenv.2020.142634

Texier, P. (2008). Floods in Jakarta: When the extreme reveals daily structural constraints and mismanagement. Disaster Prevention and Management: An International Journal, 17(3), 358–372. https://doi.org/10.1108/09653560810887284

Official Website and News

COVID-19 Task Force. (2021). Beranda | Satgas Penanganan COVID-19. Covid19.go.id. https://covid19.go.id/

Euromonitor International. (2017). Jakarta City Review. https://www.euromonitor.com/jakarta-city-review/report

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National Disaster Management Office. 2020. National Plan of Disaster Risk Reduction. www.bnpb.go.id