Disaster Risk Reduction: Building Resilient Societies

Disaster Risk Reduction: building resilient societies

A policy brief for programming

02 March 2010

Disasters and disaster trends

Disasters take a high toll on the global society. Between 2000 and 2008, an average of 392 disasters occurred per year, with around 216 million people affected per year (the equivalent to the population of Russia, Spain and Australia combined), and causing a total damage of 104 billion USD per year (around 4 times the development aid of the European Union).

As figure 1 shows, the number of disasters occurring globally has been increasing almost exponentially over the last century. With the current development of population growth, climate change, increasing urbanisation, environmental degradation and economic globalisation it is expected that this trend will continue. Several of these elements are playing at a global level, and this will have an impact on the scale of future disasters.

In general, the poor countries are most exposed to the risks of disasters, and are least able to deal with the consequences of disastrous events. Within these countries it is often the most marginalised, like the ultra-poor, women, and children, who are most affected by disasters. While the humanitarian sector has become better at saving lives in the wake of a disastrous event, it is not yet very good at saving livelihoods. Hazardous events often have a huge negative impact on the livelihoods these persons depend upon; assets are destroyed, vital services disrupted, infrastructure damaged, and the environment people depend degraded.

While there are no Millennium Development Goal (MDG) linked to disasters, disastrous events are one of the main brakes on achieving the MDGs as they have a very strong negative impact on the impact groups the MDGs try to assist (e.g. the poor, women and children) and targeted services (e.g. schools, health services, environment). Disasters also divert resources from development programmes to relief operations, thereby putting further pressure on the MDGs achievements.

Time has shown that development initiatives will not automatically reduce vulnerability of communities towards disasters. These initiatives have often not considered disaster risk, and the progress made has been lost in hazardous events. Occasionally communities have been left more vulnerable to disasters because of humanitarian or development initiatives and sometimes the initiatives have introduced new vulnerabilities or reinforced existing ones. Disastrous events are not the symptoms of ‘under development’, but are symptoms of inadequate development; development that doesn’t consider the vulnerability of communities.

Key messages: Disasters
·  are currently a big issue, and will probably become more so in the future
·  hit the most marginalised in poor countries most
·  are a serious threat to the MDGs
·  are not automatically eliminated or mitigated by development initiatives

Disaster Risk Reduction

Disasters are the result of exposure of a community to a hazardous event (e.g. earthquake, tropical cyclone) and the vulnerability of the community towards this event. Disasters can be avoided or the negative effects attenuated by building capacity. The pseudo-formula below shows the relation of these elements:

Increasing capacity and addressing hazard threats is what the discipline of Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR) aims to achieve. DRR is a cross-cutting issue; it is an approach where disaster risk is systematically assessed in a holistic way, and where relevant and possible, addressed through the development of activities that will increase the resilience of the community. These activities can consist of actions preventing disasters from happening (prevention), reducing the impact disasters have (mitigation), or that prepare societies so as to deal with the effects of a disaster when they happen (preparedness). These activities will often integrate several sectors (e.g. food security, WASH, shelter) and other cross-cutting issues (e.g. environment, gender).

Approaches and activities used in DRR and climate change adaptation (CCA) are very much in line with each other. CCA focuses on climate-related hazards, and builds on the positive effects of climate change. DRR encompasses more hazards than only climate-related ones, and focuses on the potential negative effects on communities. DRR has to consider longer-term climate change in its assessment and at community level DRR and CCA have to be integrated.

DRR is one of the pillars of poverty alleviation by strengthening livelihoods and in linking relief rehabilitation and development.

CARE International has identified DRR as one of its priorities within its mandate regarding humanitarian assistance, reconstruction and development. This makes a lot of sense as DRR is fully in line with CARE’s programming framework and principles, and excluding DRR would actually go against principles 3[1] and 6[2]. Several principles of the code of conduct[3] take directly from the DRR approach.

With the shift to the programme approach within CARE it is common sense to integrate DRR in programming. It is possible (though not good practice) to ignore disaster risk when using a project approach; if a limited number of projects are developed over a short period within a limited area, chances are that the project will not be hit by a disaster. When working in a programme approach, with a much larger space and time coverage, disasters are bound to happen, and will affect the programme. It makes thus much sense to integrate the DRR approach in programming.

Key messages: Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR)
·  can reduce the chance and impact of disastrous events in communities
·  is key in poverty alleviation and linking relief rehabilitation and development
·  is fully in line with CARE programming framework and principles; failing to integrate DRR in CARE actions goes against the CARE programming framework and principles
·  has to be systematically integrated in the programming approach if CARE programmes are to maximise their impact

DRR and the international community

The international community is more and more interested in Disaster Risk Reduction, and DRR is becoming more and more recognised as best practice in programming.

In January 2005, the World Conference on Disaster Reduction adopted the Hyogo Framework for Action (HFA), 2005 – 2015: building resilience of Nations and Communities to Disasters. The UN and other institutions were called to integrate DRR considerations into development frameworks. This included the Common Country Assessments, the United Nations Development Assistance Framework and poverty reduction strategies.

The five priorities for action of the Hyogo Framework for Action[4]:
1.  Ensure that Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR) is a national and a local priority with a strong institutional basis for implementation
2.  Identify, assess and monitor disaster risks and enhance early warning
3.  Use knowledge, innovation and education to build a culture of safety and resilience at all levels
4.  Reduce the underlying risk factors
5.  Strengthen disaster preparedness for effective response at all levels

These priorities for action shows the shift in perspective from viewing disasters as unpredictable and unavoidable events that have to be addressed by emergency specialists to a more holistic and pro-active approach that analyses disaster risk and addresses the underlying causes of disasters.

While some advancement has been made on national policy level, the roll out of the HFA in the field, and especially to the most vulnerable to disasters, is proving much more challenging[5].

The list of bilateral and multilateral donors that are currently considering DRR is large and growing. The World Bank recommends assistance that makes provisions in paying more attention to natural hazards during the appraisal of investment projects in general, and more specific in the preparation of PRSPs (Poverty Reduction Strategy Papers), CASs (Country Assistance Strategies) and other strategic documents. Other bilateral donors currently are promoting disaster risk reduction considerations into their poverty alleviation programmes. While the attention of the international community is growing, funds are only slowly becoming available.

It is however expected that the funding available will increase significantly with the linking of DRR to climate change adaptation funds.

The UN recognised the important role of national and international NGO’s in promoting DRR and their (potential) effectiveness in mainstreaming this as a cross-cutting issue into efforts aiming at structural poverty alleviation, particularly at community levels. In June 2007, the UN-International Strategy for Disaster Reduction (ISDR) facilitated the establishment of the Global Network of NGO’s, aiming to contribute to the growing global effort to reduce the impact of disasters, and build disaster resilient communities. CARE International is member of this network and the CARE DRR activities were published in the Global Network’s magazine for “Good Practices and Lessons Learnt”.

Key messages: the international community
·  increasingly recognises DRR as one of the key elements of successful programming
·  is increasingly interested in DRR and DRR mainstreaming in programming, and this trend is expected to continue
·  is expected to make more resources available for DRR and DRR mainstreaming in programming in the near future

CARE and DRR

CARE sees the mainstreaming of the DRR approach in its actions as a requisite to achieve quality programming. There is currently both a demand from within the organisation, as an expectation from the international community that organisations will mainstream DRR in their programming.

The integration of DRR, or mainstreaming, will require attention at several levels;

·  The institutional capacity of CARE ‘to implement quality DRR actions will have to be improved. This will have to be achieved by building the capacity at all levels in the organisation to mainstream DRR, and by maintaining a solid programme of both explicit DRR actions (actions that explicitly aim to increase the resilience of societies) and integrating DRR (mainstreaming of the DRR approach into programmes).

·  At regional and national level DRR will have to be integrated into programming. Disaster risks in countries where CARE is active have to be monitored, and both target communities and CARE have to be prepared for potential disasters.

·  At project level, the DRR approach will have to be applied systematically (see figure 2 for what this implies in the project cycle). CARE has to learn from its DRR actions, and this learning and experience has to be incorporated into CARE programming.

·  Policy and strategy will have to create a clear and common vision on DRR within CARE

·  External relations will have to assist CARE DRR programming in increasing quality and coverage, and will have to be employed to expand CARE’s experience, both in field projects and in research/ capacity building projects, to the global DRR body of knowledge.

DRR is still a relatively young discipline, and there are still opportunities to develop linkages to sectors or other cross-cutting issues. The time is right to integrate DRR into CARE programming. The potential for DRR to have a positive impact on communities is enormous in reducing casualties, avoiding the loss of livelihoods, and minimising disruption of societies. Developing a coherent and important DRR programme will be challenging, but it is a challenge that CARE should pick up to improve the conditions of the communities it works together with.

Key messages: CARE
·  will need to integrate the DRR approach so as to guarantee quality programming
·  will need a five-pronged approach to mainstream DRR in programming
·  can still bring innovation to the DRR body of knowledge and create its niche in DRR
·  should take advantage from the opportune moment, now is the time to mainstream DRR
·  will at best lose a big opportunity if it doesn’t adopt DRR, at worse, also suffer a mayor loss of credibility

1

[1] ‘Principle 3: Ensure accountability and promote responsibility’: where disaster risk is high it would be irresponsible from CARE towards community and donor to ignore disaster risks in its programming.

[2] ‘Principle 6: Seek sustainable results’: results from CARE actions are not sustainable if these are not made resilient against hazardous events.

[3] The Code of Conduct for the International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement and NGOs in Disaster Relief

[4] http://www.unisdr.org/eng/hfa/docs/HFA-brochure-English.pdf

[5] http://www.crid.or.cr/digitalizacion/pdf/eng/doc17597/doc17597-a.pdf