Innovative Approaches to Response Preparedness (IARP) - Early Warning, Early Action for climate related disasters
Abstract
Climate related disasters, such as floods and drought, are becoming increasingly frequent and extreme as a result of climate change. These increasingly frequent and extreme events compound disaster impact and subsequent suffering amongst those affected. Despite these increasing impacts, governments and humanitarian organizations often do not start response operations until after a disaster has taken place. This is still the case, even though disasters can often be predicted with relatively high confidence and a lead time between forecast and event in which humanitarian action to mitigate the impact and suffering of climate based disasters can be taken. It is the aim of IARP to engage with this critical time period to take action based on forecast in Kenya, Uganda and Ethiopia. Scaling up traditional preparedness and response strategies often falls short of meeting the increasing and changing needs of vulnerable people at risk of/affected by disasters. In order meet these needs and provide relevant, timely and cost-effective assistance, IARP combines three innovative approaches: • FbF: IARP establishes national scale impact-based forecast systems, which comprises SOPs that include prioritized actions which are determined alongside communities for pre-identified forecast-based triggers - coupled with committed funding. This allows rapid, optimized actions to be taken immediately after an adverse forecast is issued. • Data Preparedness: The use of data strengthens FbF in various ways. It supports the determination of impact levels for forecast-based triggers through a historical disaster impact analysis (Impact-Based forecasting). It also allows quick, high quality and relatively low-cost targeting of at-risk populations for early action through community risk modelling. • CTP: The humanitarian sector has increasingly embraced the CTP modality as an effective, dignified, and fast emergency response mechanism which can empower affected populations. By building up CTP capacity to be ready when early action is triggered by forecast, cash distribution can be rapidly deployed as a relevant, cost-efficient early action to support those at risk. These innovative approaches combine in the creation of robust national Early Warning, Early Action (EWEA) systems which are developed by Red Cross National Societies in Kenya, Ethiopia and Uganda alongside communities, supported by 510/Netherlands Red Cross, The British Red Cross, The Red Cross Climate Centre, national governments and other key stakeholders.It is hoped that such systems can allow pre-emptive actions and improve the time and cost-effectiveness of humanitarian actions, in turn reducing the impact of climate related disasters on the most vulnerable people, protecting their lives and livelihoods and supporting their development. As well as developing these systems in Kenya, Ethiopia and Uganda, this pilot seeks to evaluate the lengths to which these EWEA/FbF systems can successful and the conditions for their optimal utilization for future iterations of EWEA/FbF elsewhere in the world.
- Publication:
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EGU General Assembly Conference Abstracts
- Pub Date:
- April 2019
- Bibcode:
- 2019EGUGA..2112734B