Makati City Mayor Abby Binay smiles along with the high school students in a Makati City public school during the distribution of emergency kits. Photo courtesy of Makati City government
MANILA, Philippines — Makati Mayor Abby Binay said on Tuesday she has given out over 38,000 individually-packed emergency kits, or the so-called Go Bags, to students in public schools in the city.
Binay said the city government has given a total of 38,929 “Emergency Go Bags” to public high school students as part of its efforts to build disaster-resilient and sustainable communities.
“We want our youth to learn the importance of self-help and preparedness. Through this project, we are able to inculcate a culture of preparedness among young ‘Makatizens,’” Binay said in a statement.
A “go bag” is a portable survival kit recommended by emergency response experts for every household or facility. It is meant to help individuals or families survive, at least in the next 72 hours after a disaster.
One emergency kit contains essential goods such as food and drinking water, hygiene kit, first aid kit, flashlight, and other handy materials.
Binay said helping students adopt disaster readiness as a mindset that will make them much less vulnerable to any untoward incident or disasters.
“Resilience must be inclusive and should be pursued through the collective effort of all our stakeholders. We hope that providing our students with individually-packed go bags will motivate their parents to prepare their own go bags for the entire household,” she said.
The Makati City government, through the Makati Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Office (DRRMO), started distributing the life-saving kits during the first quarter of 2018.
It aims to provide emergency kits to 90,000 students of public schools in Makati.
The turnover ceremony of go bags was held last March 7 at 13 public high schools in Makati. /jpv