Not 'if', but 'when'
The Japan earthquake engineering symposiums are held in the middle of two consecutive World Conferences on Earthquake Engineering (WCEE) that occur every four years. The next symposium in the fall of 2010 will become the 13th. Conferences on earthquake engineering are being held respectively in the United States and Europe. In the United States, its 9th conference is held jointly with Canada, and the 14th conference in Europe Union is held at the same year 2010 as Japan. However, there is no united conference on earthquake engineering held in Asia.
Since there are many differences in not only the language and culture but also the economic condition, it is difficult to do together soon. However, because many earthquake disasters happened in Asia in the recent years, it is necessary for us to be united together on joint researches and development of new technologies, as well as spreading out the research achievements over the whole area. It is expected that the researchers in Asia will be gathered and the symposium of this time will become a kind of round-table discussion.
We are a country that suffers 20% of big earthquake that occur in the world, which is not something to boast to the world. We can say that, however, the overall measures we are taking in our country, ranging from securing earthquake resistance of civil engineering structures and building structures to the correspondence and civil action of the government and the administration after an earthquake, are the most advanced in the world, because we have done a great quantity of researches on a wide range of problems among science and engineering as well as sociology. We still cannot say it is sufficient at current state. It is still necessary to make further efforts to do more researches and put them into practical application.
The richer a country becomes, the higher the standard of living rises, the more convenient the society becomes, and the larger the shock will be after a large earthquake. We have to make the society resilient so that people's daily lives and normal social activities can be maintained, and the former social activities can be restored after a disaster of earthquake quickly and efficiently. To create a resilient society is very important from the view point of earthquake engineering, even though to create a sustainable society is a key issue in the environmental area.
Everyday people in all countries have to deal with daily concerns of life including food, homes, jobs, prospect of children, aged life, and health, etc., no matter how happy and painful they are. And because people are concerned with those needs and they often do not believe an earthquake will occur in their lifetimes, people do not take enough precautionary measures against earthquake disasters. The seismic hazard cannot be decreased if we don't take precautionary measures by thinking that a big earthquake will must happen at certain time in our future, or till grandchild, great-grandchild's generations. The central question we have to think is what we would do not "IF" an earthquake hits but "WHEN" it hits.
Our country's earthquake engineering is one of the few export technologies. We have to proceed actively to exchange and discuss science and technologies for not only our country but also many foreign countries at the symposium once in four years. Many participants and stimulating discussions are very welcome.
Akira Wada, Chairman
Organizing Committee of the 13th Japan Earthquake Engineering Symposium
