Disaster Risk Reduction

This think piece was produced by the World Food Programme in collaboration with Oxford Policy Management and sets out a vision of how social protection can support households facing climate change in Latin America and the Caribbean. It shows how climate change presents distinctive challenges to social protection programming, often differing from those of other disasters and shocks. The paper sets out ten principles for social protection designers to consider in the context of climate change.

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The mainstreaming of climate change adaptation and disaster risk reduction in social protection

Fidelis Eyoh Ukume's picture
Submitted by Fidelis Eyoh Ukume
on Mon, 04/11/2019 - 08:32
Arid land as a consequence of Climate Change
According to Monchuk (2013), increasing climate shocks have weakened global poverty reduction progress (FAO, 2017). Statistics shows that 87% of natural disasters between 1980 - 2012 were weather-related. Weather related shocks also accounted for 74% of all disaster-related losses in terms of lives and assets within the same period. In a context where the poor and vulnerable are increasingly facing multidimensional risks, which go beyond socio-economic shocks to shocks resulting from increasing climate changes and natural hazards, there has been an increasing international call - as early as 2007 (UNDP, 2007) - for the mainstreaming of climate change adaptation (CCA) and disaster risk reduction (DRR) strategies in mainstream development practice. Emerging strategies In...Read more

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The Pacific corner series: Relocation and climate change adaptation strategies

Line Jensen's picture
Submitted by Line Jensen
on Mon, 14/10/2019 - 09:25
ECHO rapid assessment Ipota post cyclone in Vanuatu. Photo Credit EC/ECHO, 2015.
In a climate-changing world, Pacific island states have been forced to displace vulnerable communities to new locations, to ensure their safety and livelihoods. When displacing people and communities, social protection strategies must involve resilience building to break the otherwise inescapable poverty trap. Building resilience and disaster prevention Building and ensuring resilience in a world of rapidly changing climate is not always possible, although it is crucial for surviving. The dictionary definition of “resilience” refers to the capacity to recover quickly from difficulties . Resilience, in connection with disasters, is an individual or a society’s capacity to prevent a natural hazard to become a disaster . Thus, by...Read more

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Adaptive and Shock Responsive Social Protection in the Caribbean: Putting People at the Centre of Resilience and Response

Francesca Ciardi's picture
Submitted by Francesca Ciardi
on Wed, 29/05/2019 - 11:14
The increased intensity of hydro meteorological events in Caribbean countries in recent years has altered landscapes, damaged infrastructure, debilitated economies, and threatens to undermine development and growth. In the midst of these impacts are Caribbean people, whose livelihoods, income, homes, well-being, and ultimately, survival, are directly threatened by climate and disaster risks. Take for instance, Hurricane Maria’s impact on Dominica in September 2017. The event caused damages and losses amounting to 226% of the country’s GDP; damaged 90% of the country’s housing stock; and affected approximately 77% of the population [1] . At the center of the disaster, were families like Josiah Stewart, who along with his mother, grandmother, and sisters lost their home and all their...Read more

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FAO and the Kuwait-based International Islamic Charity Organization (IICO) agreed to step up their cooperation to help vulnerable populations better cope with natural disasters and other shocks, which are among the key drivers of acute food insecurity.

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Five key principles for adaptive social protection programming

Alex Cornelius's picture
Submitted by Alex Cornelius
on Mon, 26/11/2018 - 11:40
‘Adaptive Social Protection’ (ASP) came from a realisation that social protection, disaster risk reduction, and climate change adaptation were three communities of practice linked by the same fundamental objective of reducing vulnerability and building resilience. Within each of these communities is a wealth of experience, tools and methods, that, if explored together, may reveal commonalities, overlapping agendas and synergies. Operationalising ASP requires a framework that supports an optimal blend of social protection programmes, climate change projects, and disaster risk reduction interventions, to bring out the best of each. ASP is still a relatively new concept, which hasn’t yet been trialled extensively enough to know how to do it well, or even how to do it. Through our work to...Read more

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Is my social protection programme ‘shock-responsive’ or ‘adaptive’?

Alex Cornelius's picture
Submitted by Alex Cornelius
on Thu, 08/11/2018 - 11:32
What is adaptive social protection? How does it differ from shock responsive social protection? Why does it matter? These were some of the questions we’ve been asked over the past three years while working with governments in the Sahel to help set up their adaptive social protection programmes. The concepts of Shock responsive social protection (SRSP) and Adaptive social protection (ASP) are very similar, and despite much having been written about them in the wider literature, there are no agreed definitions for either. You could then, question whether these two concepts are referring to the same type of programme – depending on what happens to be du jour in a particular country, institution or donor or are they in fact two closely related but fundamentally different types of...Read more

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A pilot targeted poverty alleviation program, namely, Rural Economy Advancement Programme (REAP I) was initiated in 10th five-year plan in 14 poorest villages covering 10 Dzongkhags to target extreme poverty that may not be adequately addressed by mainstream development plan programmes. With the completion of REAP I in 2012, a terminal evaluation was carried out in 2013 to study the effectiveness of the programme and to assess the worth of up-scaling the programme.

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Around the globe, there is an unending cycle of producing innovative policies that are relevant and responsive to today's complex problems of disaster risk reduction and mitigation. A lot of evidence is pointing to the shifting paradigm in responding to emergencies. Foremost among them is the growing acceptance of cash transfers as a response tool to disasters. The Philippines is not oblivious to this developing paradigm. The Philippines is considered to have one of the most advanced social protection (SP) systems in the East Asia Pacific region.

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The use of Cash Transfer Programming (CTP) to provide humanitarian assistance so that people may access the goods and services they need before, during and following a crisis has been gaining momentum over the past decade.

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