The Municipality of Gjilan/Gnjilane, Municipal Spatial Support Planning Programme (MuSPP) and Gymnasium “Zenel Hajdini” organized a workshop on disaster reduction in case of earthquakes. The workshop followed two studies done by UN-HABITAT and Municipality of Gjilan/Gnjilane supported by ISIIS institute from Skopje, which confirmed that Municipality of Gjilan/Gnjilane is part of an active earthquake zone, the same as Skopje. In this regard, municipality gave priority to enforcement of public buildings focusing especially on school buildings.

The main purpose of the workshop was to provide basic disaster awareness to school students and teachers on School Earthquake Safety and Preparedness. In his presentation, Nehat Ibrahimi, officer for emergency planning in Municipality of Gjilan/Gnjilane, said that there are two types of disasters that occur in Kosovo as natural and man-made disasters. He repeated again that Municipality of Gjilan/Gnjilane is vulnerable to earthquakes which can’t be prevented, but damages can be reduced.     

The presentation delivered by Zoran Milutinovic, Ph.D. from the Institute of Earthquake Engineering and Engineering Seismology in Skopje, Macedonia (ISIIS) who described case reflected Skopje earthquake in 1963 and the resulting fatality figures. He said that Mediterranean zone in Europe is an active zone of earthquakes. Considering that most of the participants in this workshop were school pupils, he assured them that there is no place for panic, because school facilities are structurally stronger than their houses. He explained that in the case of earthquakes there are some instructions that need to be followed.

At the end, the director of the school welcomed this workshop saying that those workshops are very important and he thanked Municipality of Gjilan/Gnjilane and MuSPP team for rising awareness of the pupils about  natural disasters.