Observing Disaster Management in Lebanon through an Analysis of Disasters in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Japan

Abstract

On August 4, 2020, the ammonium nitrate in Lebanon inflicted devastating health, environmental, and infrastructural consequences on the population due to a massive explosion radius that was accompanied by slowed recovery efforts and strains on the nation’s supply of aid due to the country’s struggles to tackle the pandemic and rush patients to emergency simultaneously. It is important that this human development issue receives attention in the field because Lebanon is home to many people that require life-sustaining aid, especially the 3 quarters of the population that lives in poverty due to mass unemployment. Furthermore, 1.5 million Syrian refugees reside in Lebanon due to their need for a haven to escape the humanitarian crisis in their homeland after the election of an oppressive President. In terms of the safety risks that disasters pose to the people of Lebanon, health infrastructure took a huge blow from the recent ammonium nitrate explosion and caused many of the Lebanese people to bleed out due to the absence of medical assistance and kits to reduce their injuries. Research on Congolese and Japanese disasters aims to find a way to embrace the use of data science in Lebanon as it is constantly recovering from frequent explosions. As of now, the country is not efficiently implementing GIS tracking systems and other data science research methods to solve its issue of non-residential districts and insufficient aid allocation, which jeopardizes the health of civilians during a state of emergency. The data methods that will be examined to look for alternative ways for dealing with large scale explosions in Lebanon are the methods of proper usage of cell cluster data, inspired by the uniquely volcanic region of the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Another method that will be examined is the use of the Topsy method in Japan to analyze trends in social media that could potentially increase aid allocation to Lebanon. A gap in the literature of these methods is that they all heavily depend on the adaptation of institutions to fund research. There are still many places in Lebanon in which people live and are designated under a “non-residential” zone, which can largely be attributed to the gentrification of the main city and the subsequent collapse of the outskirts. Now that the original research question, “Why have existing methods of tracking migration patterns not been successful in Lebanon and how can sustainable methods be implemented to account for Lebanon’s explosions in order to foster a safe and effective transportation of aid to communities in danger ?” has become clearer, it is time that a new research question be developed. How can data convince officials that these methods can be sustainable and that taking action can benefit the country of Lebanon in the long run?