The government said Thursday it has devised comprehensive disaster-prevention measures and greatly increased next year's budget for the efforts to better cope with climate change in the wake of deadly downpours this summer.
At least 74 people were killed in landslides and flash floods after the heaviest rainfall in nearly a century battered the country in late July.
The government set up a task force in August to overhaul the disaster-prevention system and tighten safety standards, after President Lee Myung-bak blamed the torrential rains on climate change and called for greater efforts to battle the phenomenon.
Under the envisioned plan, the government will build nearly 1,000 erosion control dams per year over the next decade to prevent landslides. It will also establish 256 sewage treatment facilities by 2020, which is expected to reduce the areas flooded by more than 100 millimeters of rain per hour from the current 18.2 percent to 1.3 percent, according to the Prime Minister's Office (PMO).
The government also plans to refurbish rivers including small streams across the country, and to run afforestation projects aimed at protecting cities and residential areas from disasters, the PMO added.
To push for the new measures, the government increased next year's budget for its disaster prevention efforts by 21 percent from a year earlier to around 5 trillion won (US$4.42 billion), according to the PMO.
"The sharp increase in the budget reflects the government's strong will to better deal with disasters so as to protect lives and property of the people," Yook Dong-han, the vice minister of the Prime Minister's Office said.
Over the past century, the average temperature on the Korean Peninsula went up by 1.8 degrees Celsius, more than double the global average. During the period, the country experienced more torrential rains, with the amount of precipitation rising 17 percent, according to government data.
The trend is forecast to accelerate, pushing up the country's temperature by 3.2 degrees and the amount of rainfall by 15.6 percent by 2050, data showed. (Yonhap)