Resource information
Reconstruction should include a range of
measures to enhance safety: disaster prevention facilities,
relocation of communities to higher ground, and evacuation
facilities. A community should not, however, rely too
heavily on any one of these as being sufficient, because the
next tsunami could be even larger than the last. Communities
also need to rebuild their industries and create jobs to
keep their residents from moving away. The challenge is to
find enough relocation sites that are on high enough ground
and large enough, and to regulate land use in lowland areas.
There are two tiers of local government in Japan,
prefectures and local municipalities, which are responsible
for disaster response and reconstruction. Municipal
governments play the most important role because they are
closest to the victims and the stricken areas. The
prefectural governments are grappling with the broad
reconstruction issues. All reconstruction plans aim at
rebuilding towns and communities that are resilient to major disasters.
