Xiao Meiqin urges rapid recovery for climate resilience, calls for infrastructure upgrade

Facing the severe challenges posed by global climate change, urban governance and national security in Taiwan are welcoming a brand-new turning point. Attending a public event today, Vice President Hsiao Bi-khim delivered a speech specifically addressing the issue of extreme climate, emphasizing that the true essence of resilience lies not in never being harmed, but in possessing the ability to recover rapidly. She pointed out bluntly that as extreme weather gradually becomes the new normal, Taiwan's urban and national infrastructure must not be overly fragile, nor can it fall into a predicament of total paralysis when encountering natural disasters. Her remarks highlight that when confronting the climate crisis, Taiwan must transform from traditional disaster prevention thinking into systematic resilience building.

In her remarks, Hsiao deeply analyzed the core value of the concept of resilience. She pointed out that many people mistakenly believe having resilience means being immune to all disasters and shocks; however, in reality, the intensity and frequency of natural disasters and extreme weather often exceed expectations, and no system can guarantee being one hundred percent unscathed. Therefore, true resilience means that when facing sudden shocks, a system can not only withstand the blow but also resume operations in the shortest possible time. This combination of "tolerance" and "recovery capacity" serves as the core guiding principle and inspection indicator for Taiwan as it currently promotes various national construction projects and urban governance.

Examining global climate trends in recent years, the frequency and destructive power of torrential rains, droughts, high temperatures, and strong typhoons are significantly increasing, and Taiwan, as an island nation, bears the brunt of these impacts. Past urban planning was mostly based on historical meteorological data, and design standards are often incapable of coping with current record-breaking extreme rainfall or extreme high temperatures. Once torrential rains strike, domino effects such as overloaded urban drainage systems, flooded traffic arteries, and interrupted power and communication systems follow one after another. This is precisely the phenomenon of total paralysis that the Vice President worries about. Therefore, how to re-examine and upgrade existing infrastructure has already become an urgent national security and livelihood issue.

To prevent cities from being vulnerable in the face of natural disasters, Hsiao emphasized the necessity of building robust infrastructure equipped with key backup mechanisms and rapid repair capabilities. This means that future public engineering projects cannot merely consider peacetime economic benefits and operational efficiency; they must also incorporate "disaster resistance, backup systems, and risk diversification" into their core considerations. For example, water resource dispatching needs diverse backups, power grid systems need to move toward decentralized microgrids to avoid total regional blackouts caused by a single node failure, and transportation networks require alternative routes and contingency plans for emergency repairs. The upgrading of such hardware facilities requires not only massive resource inputs but also close cross-departmental and central-local cooperation.

In addition to strengthening hardware construction, the soft power of urban governance and the psychological resilience of society as a whole are equally indispensable. When extreme weather becomes the new normal, the government's disaster early-warning system must be more precise and real-time, and the disaster prevention awareness and self-rescue capabilities of community residents must be upgraded simultaneously. From the central government to local governments, more efficient crisis response and horizontal communication mechanisms must be established to ensure that during the golden rescue window when a disaster occurs, information can be transmitted transparently and resources can reach their destinations accurately. Only when hardware infrastructure and social software resilience advance on dual tracks can Taiwan's cities stand firm amidst the torrent of climate change and ensure the stability and safety of societal operations.

(Source: Central News Agency)