The Impacts of Tsunami on the Well-Being of the Affected Community in Kuala Muda, Kedah, Malaysia
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Journal of Clean Energy Technologies, Vol. 1, No. 3, May 2013 The Impacts of Tsunami on the Well-Being of the Affected Community in Kuala Muda, Kedah, Malaysia M. Zainora Asmawi and Aisyah Nadhrah Ibrahim missing [1]. This tsunami had claimed 68 lives in Malaysia, Abstract—The tsunami of 26 December 2004 was one of the mostly in Penang, besides Langkawi Islands, Kota Kuala most devastating tragedy ever occurred to men in the history of Muda,Kedah , Perak and Selangor. human civilization. Approximately 250,000 lives perished, millions injured and suffered, while the destruction of property loss of opportunities cannot be accurately estimated. The impact of the tsunami on environmental destruction shows that II. PROBLEM STATEMENTS damage was inflicted on natural resources such as coral reefs, The impact on coastal fishing communities and the people mangroves, sand dunes and other coastal ecosystem that acted living within the coastal areas, some of the poorest in the as wave defense barriers. Moreover, inlands, wetlands and agricultural land were salinated and natural resources for region has been devastating with high losses of income livelihood and for source of income were badly affected, earners as well as boats and fishing gear[2].The disaster especially for coastal communities who were involve in fisheries. devastated communities with its high toll of human lives, The situation worsened as basic facilities were also destroyed. injuries, family networks, homes and livelihoods. The As such, this research focuses on assessing and identifying on majority of those affected on the coast were fishermen who how the impacts of the tsunami on the infrastructure and environmental resources affected the community well-being suffered the most damage in terms of housing and livelihoods inKuala Muda, Kedah, Malaysia. This study focuses on the with loss of dwelling units, household assets, and productive impacts of tsunami on the affected community well-being in the assets like boats and nets. This situation also happened in coastal zone on the basis of available primary and secondary Kuala Muda whereby the affected fishing villagers lost most sources. Primary sources included questionnaires, interviews and observations while the secondary resources included books, of their valuable belongings including lives. government and international reports, scientific journals, maps A World Health Organization (WHO) funded a study by and articles that highlighted tsunami related issues. The study the University of Indonesia reported that 20–25% of children tries to seek for both qualitative and quantitative impacts and affected by the tsunami in Aceh required professional also tries to find out some solutions that would help to minimize treatment for psychosocial problems. Additionally, a the impact of the tsunami on the community well-being. The information gained from this study can be used to help the dramatic increase in the demand for counseling and community as well as the agencies involve in order to minimize psychological cares, including tertiary-referral specialized the impacts of the tsunami on the community and develop a care, was registered in the entire country. Not all these were more effective mitigation measures for other environmental people who had been directly affected; some were people in disasters such as tsunami. Besides, the research may help to create awareness on the community to be prepared in facing nearby areas who vicariously shared the trauma of the disastrous situation such as the tsunami. Through community tsunami and worried about the possibility of new waves. preparedness, the impact can be minimized and reduced. As for the authority, this research may be of great assistance by allowing them to make better decision. III. GOAL AND OBJECTIVES Index Terms—Tsunami, well-being, affected community, The goal of this study is to understand and to analyse the Malaysia. impacts of tsunami towards the well-being of the affected community. These are the objectives of the study in order to achieve the goal: I. INTRODUCTION 1) To describe the existing condition of the coastal On 26th December 2004, several countries on the Indian environment; and Ocean were hit by tsunami. This phenomenon was triggered 2) To identify the impacts of the tsunami on community by a massive earthquake with the recorded magnitude of 9.0 well-being in terms of physical infrastructure, and on the Richter scale, with the epicenter just off the west coast environmental aspects. of North Sumatera, Indonesia. Malaysia was affected by tsunami besides Indonesia (Aceh), Sri Lanka, Thailand, India, IV. SCOPE OF STUDY Maldives, Myanmar, Bangladesh, Somalia, Seychelles, Tanzania, Kenya and Yemen. Approximately 224, 685 death Based on Table I below, the scope for this study can be were reported, 174, 729 confirmed dead and 49, 956 still divided into two sections. The first section covers the perception of the community on tsunami. The scope under this part addresses the general knowledge of the community Manuscript received December 20, 2012; revised January 22, 2013. Aisyah Nadhrah Ibrahim is with International Islamic University on tsunami. The second part discusses about the impact of the Malaysia, Malaysia (e-mail: [email protected]). tsunami on the community well-being. DOI: 10.7763/JOCET.2013.V1.56 246 Journal of Clean Energy Technologies, Vol. 1, No. 3, May 2013 V. RESEARCH METHODOLOGY Kg Masjid, Kg Tepi Sungai and Kg Kepala Jalan. The study was conducted on 211 people from Kota Kuala M1: Kg. PulauSayak Muda,Kedah. Observations and questionnaire survey were Kg. PulauSayak was the least affected area of the stretch of the main tools in conducting this study. The questions that Kuala Muda coastal area. Most of the fringes along were asked in the survey were not only limited to the people PulauSayak were full of mangrove forest. This is also one of who are directly affected by the tsunami but also to the the main reasons why Kg PulauSayak was the least damaged surrounding communities who are also indirectly affected by area when the tsunami occurred. The mangrove acted as a the event. natural wave breaker for that coast area. Besides, there was only a small population which lives in Kg. PulauSayak which TABLE I: THE SCOPE OF STUDY mostly earns their living as fishermen. Scope Description M2: Kg. Sungai Yu and Kg. Sungai Meriam • Coastal hazards which are prone to Malaysia Kg Sungai Yu and Kg Sungai Meriam are located right Perception of the • Awareness on the early warning system on next to each other. The villagers that lived in this area were community on tsunami mostly involved in agricultural activities but in a small scale • tsunami Their opinion on the factors which can lead to or for family basis such as coconut and bananas. There was tsunami. How does the tsunami affect their well-being, in also a small factory running there for livestock such as chickens and ducks. The area that was affected or damaged Impact of tsunami terms of: on the community 1. Loss of income by the tsunami was rather a small portion of this. Mostly the 2. Damages to property well-being. affected areas were the residential areas which now have 3. Daily routine 4. Emotional effect been repaired back with the donations, funds and aids given by the national bodies and several others local The main tools ofdata collection in conducting the study Non-Governmental Organization (NGOs). were observation and self-administered questionnaire, containing closed-ended and open-ended questions.The questionnaireswere divided into four sections. The first section is related to the respondents’ profiles. The second section covered the existing condition of Kuala Muda coastal area and the third section was directed to the impacts of tsunami on the community well-being. The Likert scale measurement was used for every statement for the environmental issues on a 5 point scale. Each alternative item was assigned from 1 (strongly agreed), 2 (agreed), 3 (undecided), 4 (disagreed) 5 (strongly disagreed) for favorable items. Thiswould enable the respondents to rate each and every variables based on their personal level of concerned. Scoring system subsequently was employed in the research in order to identify the variables with higher and lower weighted scoring, and the pre-determined items were arranged accordingly to priority. This was done by allocating numeric value to the options, for example, if the respondents chose the option as the first choice they would be scored 4, second choice as 3, third choice as 2 and forth choice as 1 and the last choice as 0 mark. Then, all the data were keyed in SPSS software for analytical process. VI. ANALYSIS AND FINDINGS A. Observation on the Existing Condition of Luala Muda, Kedah. Fig. 1. Sections of study area From the site visit which have been carried out, the existing condition of the coastal area of Kuala Muda can be M3: Kg. Payaand M4: Kg. Padang Salim described as the following. There were eight villages which Kg Paya and Kg Padang Salim areas were moderately have been visited and it have been categorized into 5 sections damaged by the tsunami event. This was due to its distance (Fig 1). The selected eight villages referring to the ones that located very near to Kg Masjid and Kg Tepi Sungai, which have been badly hit directly by the tsunami on the 26th which were badly damaged by the tsunami. Most of the December 2004. Section 1 (M1) consists of Kg. Pulau Sayak, damaged areas were residential areas. There were a few Section 2 (M2) consists of Kg Sungai Yu and Kg Sungai houses, badly damaged and could not be repaired. But there Meriam, Section 3 (M3) consists of Kg. Paya, Setion 4 (M4) were also a few of the houses which their structures were still consists of Kg Padang Salim and Section 5 (M5) consists of intact and were restored back.