“We have to take a holistic approach,” says WFP’s Maguelita Varin, “because if children don’t wash their hands and then eat, they can get sick. They’ve been installed by the UN Children’s Fund, UNICEF, to ensure that the children learn good hygiene habits such as washing hands before meals.Ī child washes her hands before eating a school meal., by UN Haiti/Daniel DickinsonĪnd UNICEF has provided books to study the French language, maths and other subjects as well as desks where students can comfortably study. Small handwashing stations fashioned from buckets stand on platforms outside each classroom. In most schools, the initiative is focused on more than just providing a meal to hungry children. This school is just one of more than 1,600 where WFP is providing meals to around 344,000 students. This school feeding programme was in operation before the earthquake which struck south-west Haiti on 14 August, leading to the deaths of more than 2,200 people an additional 12,700 were injured and key infrastructure, such as bridges, roads, hospitals and schools, was destroyed or damaged. In the long run, that is good for our community.” It will give the children energy to carry on studying and provide support to their parents. That’s why this school feeding programme is so important. “They can no longer cultivate food,” says Principal Sylvestre, “so they cannot feed their children properly. The most significant impact has been on the parents of these children, many of whom lost their farms or missed the planting season due to the earthquake. KMA has also made a leading role as a member state of the Intergovernmental Cooperation Group for the Pacific Tsunami Warning System (ICG/PTWS).Banana leaves cover two pots of beans and wheat, school meals for over 300 children. In addition, KMA has made efforts toward international cooperation by sharing information on earthquakes with the International Seismological Center (ISC) and neighboring countries such as United States, Japan and China. More seismograph stations will continue to be installed in the near future. The Korea National Seismographic Network(KNSN), with 264 observations, including 95 broadband (one overlapped with very broadband) and 27 short-period seismographs and 142 accelerograph stations, was set up to monitor earthquakes occurring in the Korean Peninsula and its vicinity. Two tsunamis, generated by earthquakes in the sea near the western coast of Japan, caused damage to the eastern coast of Korea in both 19. In particular, the earthquake which occurred in Gyeongju, Gyeongsangbuk-do in 2016, with a magnitude of 5.8, is regarded as a recent example of a typical damaging earthquake in Korea. Nine earthquakes having a magnitude of over 5.0 have occurred in Korea since 1978.
Although only a few damaging earthquakes occurred in Korea, about 37 minor and intermediate earthquakes occur annually, 10 of which record over 3.0 in Richter scale.