PAID Romania Director General Nicoleta Radu said on Thursday that in Romania only 20% of the population has home insurance, pointing to risks that uninsured Romanians may run into in the aftermath of disasters.

"Natural events can cause damage. I think we have enough reasons to stop thinking that it can't happen to us. It is happening to us, and things have happened to us in recent years that we would never have thought of. That's why I say that there are things that should make us think more when we have to make decisions regarding our protection," said Radu at the National Library.

She participated in the opening of ReExpozitia, a competitive photography exhibition of aftermaths of natural disasters also featuring photos from the AGERPRES picture library.

She said that for the protection against disasters, "there is an insurance mechanism that should be activated."

"In Romania, there is the mandatory home insurance designed to cover the three risks of impact - earthquake, landslides and flood. It is an affordable mechanism. The policy was 8 lei per month and despite all this it is difficult to explain why in Romania only 20% of the population has home insurance. Practically, in Romania, four out of five homes do not have any kind of protection against natural disasters (...) We would like those who visit the exhibition to take out insurance as well," added Radu.

Head of the Disaster Prevention Service with the General Emergency Management Inspectorate Francisc Senzaconi called for "increasing resilience" by preparing for major events such as natural disasters.

"We are living in a world where disasters have started to become more and more 'common', that is, we meet them more and more often. And yet we are not aware of their impact on us. In addition to the measures of the government (...), there is a part of prevention that is available to citizens and that applies not in the acute stage of disasters, which we manage, but in the post-disaster stage, when the needs of the population change. Insurance is one of such tools," said Senzaconi.

AGERPRES National News Agency Director General Claudia Nicolae said the agency has a direct relationship both with the authorities and with those affected by natural disasters.

"We are a precious depository, I say, not in praise of the organisation I lead, of 4.5 million photos in the picture library of AGERPRES, with the oldest one being of a flood in 1927. Ours is a direct relationship. Officials have disaster prevention campaigns, insurers try to prevent, because no one wants to end up in a disaster, and we, journalists, have the role of disseminating this information. We have pictures of aftermaths of disasters. You should know that these pictures are not the only ones in the AGERPRES archives. We also have images with a ray of hope, when trying to rebuild and rehabilitate the destroyed," said Nicolae.

She said that photographs remain the most faithful witnesses of an event where journalists and authorities "try to help".

"We can write as journalists, we can tell stories, we can cover reactions, we can present statements of officials, but photographs remain in time and they make the strongest impact on a citizen. (...) Along with journalists, we will see firefighters at the scene, we will see the Emergency Management Inspectorate trying lives, trying to help. We immortalise the moment, while the authorities try to lend a helping hand," she added.

ReExpozitia opened on Thursday, October 13, the International Day for Disaster Reduction, at the National Library of Romania.

It is a project of the Natural Disaster Insurance Pool (PAID) designed to remind Romanians about the cyclical and repetitive nature of disasters.

Taken by professionals and amateurs, the photos are part of a wide-ranging campaign to raise public awareness over the repetitive nature of natural disasters and the importance of home insurance against them.

The exhibition, whose opening was postponed due to the events in Ukraine, can be visited until October 26.

The Natural Disaster Insurance Pool - PAID - is a component of the Romanian catastrophe insurance program, a programme managed by the Ministry of Internal Affairs. PAID administers the mandatory home insurance system that covers three basic risks specific to Romania - earthquake, floods and landslides. The actual activity of PAID started in February 2010, and the first day of issuing the mandatory insurance for homes was July 15, 2010.

AGERPRES is a media partner of the event. AGERPRES (RO - author: Daniel Popescu, editor: Catalin Alexandru; EN - author: Corneliu-Aurelian Colceriu, editor: Adina Panaitescu)