Amid disasters and emergencies, UNGRD's budget is expected to fall for the second consecutive year: the entity is already underfunded, according to its director.

In the new bill seeking to establish the General National Budget (PGN), many entities presented significant cuts to the resources allocated to them by the Nation, one of them being the National Disaster Risk Management Unit (UNGRD).

The initiative, which was filed on Monday afternoon, allocates a total of 699.497 billion pesos to the entity, which represents a reduction compared to the 724.832 billion pesos allocated by the PGN for the current fiscal year.

Added to this is the fact that, particularly in the investment area, where resources for disaster risk prevention and mitigation are allocated, the reduction was 41 percent, from 17 billion in 2025 to 10 billion next year.

What's striking is that this would be the second consecutive year in which UNGRD's funding has been cut, considering that the entity's 2024 budget was 780.279 billion pesos, meaning the entity lost just over 80 billion pesos in its budget allocation in two years, or 11 percent. It's worth noting that if the figures are adjusted for inflation, the situation would be much more worrying.

And the reduction of resources for an entity like the UNGRD can become very worrying, since a large part of these resources are allocated by the Nation to attend to all types of emergencies, which in a country that is experiencing the ravages of climate change like Colombia (with more and more extreme or prolonged weather events such as the El Niño phenomenon in 2024, which caused, among other things, major droughts and a high number of forest fires; or the current rainy season in the country).

For the remainder of the year alone, the forecasts are alarming. The most recent report from the Institute of Hydrology, Meteorology, and Environmental Studies (IDEAM), issued on July 23, indicates that the country is facing two simultaneous threats: forest fires due to high temperatures and landslides caused by persistent rains.

According to IDEAM, 324 municipalities—28.8 percent of the country's 1,123 municipalities—are on some level of alert for forest fire risk, especially in the Caribbean, Pacific, and Andean regions. Of these, 55 municipalities are on red alert, with the most critical departments being Tolima (28 municipalities), Cundinamarca (10), and La Guajira (6).

On the other hand, 238 municipalities (21.1 percent of the total) are on alert for possible landslides in municipalities in all regions of the country, but particularly concentrated in the departments of Chocó (24 municipalities), Antioquia and Boyacá (13 each), and Casanare (8).

And given this situation, UNGRD is already warning that resources will not be sufficient to address any emergencies that may arise, something Carlos Carrillo, the director of the organization, has already warned about on several occasions.

This is what he explained in a recent interview with EL TIEMPO published on Sunday, July 27: “The harsh reality is that there's no more money in the 2025 budget allocated to the management subdirectorate, which is responsible for disaster management. So we've had to defund structural projects and the entity's other mission lines because everything is going to serve the departments and municipalities. I want to emphasize that we've done so much that all of this year's money was consumed because the rainy season is extremely severe.”

To that, he added: " There are five months left until the end of the year, and the fiscal squeeze is enormous . This must be said at this time when a new budget is being opened. We must call on Congress to assume the importance of its power."

The current rainy season has extended beyond expectations, and other important climatic events are yet to come, such as the second-heaviest rainy season in the Andean region, or the tropical cyclone and hurricane season in the Caribbean (which officially began on June 1 and will run until November 30), which, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), has a 60 percent chance of being more intense than normal.

All of these events could bring emergencies such as flash floods, storms, and even forest fires, with the corresponding impacts on communities. This makes it necessary to have resources available to address these situations if they arise. Hence Carrillo's concern that the current administration's resources are not enough.

That's why a further reduction in temperatures in 2026 is a cause for concern. At the moment, there's no official forecast for next year's weather, but considering the past five years and the forecasts of national and international organizations, it wouldn't be surprising to see increasingly extreme events.

Even Carrillo maintains that this probability is very high: “This is a situation that will continue. Climate variability is a reality. The climate crisis the world is experiencing means that territories are more vulnerable, and that phenomena are increasingly more numerous and more intense. The country must adapt its institutions to face this new climate reality. We must create new institutions. But that's not the government's job; Congress creates them. We must modify the institutions so that they have greater response capacities. We must provide them with funding.”

And we must not lose sight of the ever-present threat of other phenomena not necessarily attributable to climatic conditions. The earthquake of June 8 of this year in Paratebueno, Cundinamarca, or the alerts for activity inside the Nevado del Ruíz Volcano in the first half of 2023 are reminders that there are emergencies that cannot always be predicted and for which the various entities of the National Risk Management System, including UNGRD, must have the necessary capacity to respond.

In the aforementioned interview with Carrillo, the director of UNGRD was asked whether this reduction in funding for the institution could be due to some sort of retaliation for the corruption case involving the former director, Olmedo López.

To this, Carrillo replied: "That wouldn't be a punishment for the entity, but rather a punishment for me. The thing is, Olmedo López was given 1.6 trillion pesos to be stolen. Olmedo made a super-sham deal for military bridges, spending 45 billion pesos on bridges that had three intermediaries and that could have been obtained directly, achieving better conditions, which is what we want to do, but now we don't have the money to buy the bridges. Olmedo, on the other hand, had the means to do whatever he wanted. It would be quite curious if the crook were given the money and the person who had it safely kept it safe wouldn't give it to him. But I don't think it's a punishment; I have no evidence that leads me to believe that. If it is, it would be very serious."

MATEO CHACÓN ORDUZ | Life Subeditor