Recovery, Renewal, Resilience

This case study, written by Eduardo Robles Chavez and the Manchester Briefing team, presents examples of effective vulnerability mapping during COVID-19 in New Zealand and Wales, contrasting these with Mexico and Chile where mapping focused only on infection rates. Read this case study by following the source link below (p.13-16)

During COVID-19, schools were forced to move to remote delivery of teaching. The Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC) note that high levels of pre-existing inequalities (e.g. poverty) have exacerbated the negative impacts of the pandemic on children’s education. The World Bank report predicts that the “shock on human capital will substantially reduce intergenerational mobility and the likelihood of children from low educated families to complete secondary school”. The bank also presents a call to action to address the significant learning loss experienced by Latin American and Caribbean children. As countries are transitioning back to face-to-face or to more hybrid styles of education delivery, consider:

• Work in partnership with schools, community groups (e.g. parental committees) and local social care services to identify vulnerable children and develop targeted measures (e.g. through remedial programmes) to ensure that schools are teaching at an appropriate level for all children. Specifically take into account the learning needs of children from lower-income families who may not have had the resources at home to keep up with remote learning measures
  • For example, ‘Alerta Escuela’, Peru uses early warning systems to identify students who are at risk of dropping out or who are in need of targeted interventions
• Guide and support schools on how best to combine remote and in-person learning (e.g. the Ceibal initiative in Uruguay). To increase accessibility, blended learning recovery solutions should consider low- or no-tech options (e.g. educational TV programmes/local radio/community youth groups)
• Design a long-term transformational plan for accelerating the digital transformation of local and national Education Management and Information Systems (EMIS), for example:
  • The World Bank is collaborating with education agencies to establish a “new generation of EMIS based on an enterprise architecture focusing on learning data”. The programme will collate best practices, tools and guidance that aim to enable education agencies to implement technology-driven solutions that accelerate cost effective educational programmes and generate high investment returns

See also TMB Issue 33 – a case study which explores the “attainment gap” and digital divide, detailing international strategies that aim to support children to catch up on learning time lost during the pandemic

CarbonBrief have developed an interactive grid where you can explore and track the progress of how different countries across the world are implementing green recovery and renewal plans which aim to cut emissions in the aftermath of COVID-19. Below, we offer some examples of diverse initiatives from across the world:

• France allocated funding to “promote and support environmental performance” in their food and agricultural sector, e.g. funding to support farmers to adapt their farming systems to lower their impact on the environment. France have also allocated funding to create over 1,000 “eco-responsible restaurants in rural communities”, along with investment in “energy efficiency of public and private buildings, social housing, insulation and low-carbon heating”
• Sweden allocated investment to raise the “energy performance of Sweden’s housing stock and to support improvements in rental properties”
• Finland plan to “phase out oil heating in both households and public buildings” and allocated funding to the “wood constriction programme which promotes the use of timber by enhancing industry expertise, developing legislation and building regulations, and providing factual information”
• Chile have committed to plant trees on 24,000 hectares of land and invest in better fire management as part of its “mitigation and adaptation commitments related to forests and biodiversity”. Chile will also have invested in modernisation and irrigation projects for farmers, as part of the COVID-19 budget response

A recent study found that the Canadian disaster news media framed young people in five different ways: “1. the vulnerable status of youth; 2. youth as passive bystanders; 3. children as a burden on adults; 4. youth as active agents; and 5. youth as a ‘legitimizing criteria’ in disaster response” (where certain response and recovery resources/actions are prioritized to enable young people to “bounce back” following crisis). The findings of this research highlight a need to shift the narrative and change how young people are framed in emergencies, to recognise their assets and potential roles in disaster risk reduction, emergency response and recovery efforts. Consider:

• Meaningful, inclusive, collaborative and creative strategies to engage young people in all stages of disaster risk and risk management, e.g. Colombia: The school of our dreams where young people create music videos to teach others about the value of protective and protected schools:
  • Enable “Self-driven participation” (youth-owned and led engagement) where young people take ownership and identify risks, and manage the process and outcomes, supported by adults when necessary
  • Establish “Collaborative participation” (adult-owned and youth-led engagement) where adults establish collaboration and invite young people to support the identification of issues. Partnerships are established between adults and young people in a form of “inter-generational collaboration”, a partnership which allows young people to increase their levels of self-directed action over time
• In the Philippines, children are participating in “school-watching programmes” where they gather information about risks that can be addressed by local school authorities. The children create hazard maps which can be shared to educate other students on risk and safety information
• Recognise the role of young people in creating resilience in communities, e.g. Injuv (The National Youth Institute in Chile) who focus on ways in which young people can be involved, activated and mobilised in emergency response during crisis. They have been working to establish and ecosystem of permanent local youth volunteers, and connect young volunteers directly with voluntary organisations through an online volunteer platform (Transform Country Network)
• Utilize the media to amplify the voices and efforts of young people as catalysts for change in their communities, to create a platform through which young people can share their ideas, opinions and concerns

People with disabilities are more likely to be unemployed or not in education or training, which makes them more vulnerable to the impacts of the pandemic, including increased risk of poverty. Recovery strategies to address the economic impacts of the pandemic should be disability-inclusive. Consider:

• Review/amend social protection systems to better protect people with disabilities during COVID-19:
  • Raise poverty thresholds to take disability-related additional costs into account
  • Revise the definition of disability in assessment procedures, to ensure they are functioning-based rather than impairment-based
  • Train volunteer community members to support the rapid identification of people with disabilities for social protection or other assistance: these community volunteers are sometimes called 'key informants' (KIs), are knowledgeable about the topic, the local area and the people who live there
• Ensure application procedures for social protection programmes and support services are accessible in the light of COVID-19 social distancing regimes:
  • Include disabled people's organisations when reviewing the accessibility of application processes and when disseminating information about support programmes
  • Adapt application and enrolment procedures to support the inclusion of people with disabilities
  • Provide disability training to programme staff and volunteers, e.g. disability awareness
  • Ensure programme information and application materials are available in a variety of accessible formats, e.g. Braille/videos/simplified text
  • Establish COVID-safe community-based registration services to bring services closer to people, and offer person/home-based assessment procedures for those with mobility limitations
• Ensure methods to deliver social protection services and welfare payments are accessible:
  • Allow welfare payments to be paid electronically or enable people with mobility difficulties to nominate a trusted individual to collect their
  • Ensure service points are physically accessible and within the person's local community
• Ensure employment schemes are adequate and accessible for people with disabilities during COVID-19:
  • Set up employment schemes to actively employ persons with disabilities, integrating such schemes into broader employment recovery schemes, e.g. green recovery
  • Make infrastructure accessible, e.g. buildings and workplaces
  • Introduce unemployment insurance to cover the informal sector, as people with disabilities, in particular women with disabilities, are more likely to be employed in the informal sector where there is an absence of job security, unemployment insurance and paid sick leave