Recovery, Renewal, Resilience

TMB 36 discussed the potential role of young people in reducing and responding to disaster risk. The lesson details meaningful, inclusive, and creative strategies for engaging young people in all stages of DRR such as youth-led/collaborative participation. A recent addition to the Sendai Framework Voluntary Commitments details The Africa Youth Advisory Board on DRR (AYAB DRR), a collective established to encourage meaningful youth engagement and participation in DRR policy development, implementation and evaluation across Africa. Consider:

• Connect with local youth-led/youth-focused organisations, invite these organisations to collaborate on all stages of DRR and connect their voices with local decision makers
• Support young people as agents of change by acting as a facilitator/brokerage to connect their groups and initiatives to resilience partners who can inform and coach/take inspiration from youth-led DRR initiatives. This activity could also support the development of local/regional networks between young people and resilience partners
• Use online platforms (websites, social media etc.) to create open, accessible and inclusive knowledge sharing capacity for youth-led DRR groups/organisations, or to showcase, celebrate and promote their work. For example:
  • The Himalayan Risk Research Institute is developing a platform for disaster risk reduction students, researchers and young professionals. The initiative aims to develop a “skill transfer mechanism” whereby training, field research and workshops can build the knowledge and skills of young scientists and professionals and in turn benefit local DRR activities
• Enable the mobilization of youth groups, by increasing their access to local resources (e.g. community spaces they could use) and support “physical and virtual capacity building” to improve their visibility, inclusion and active participation

Diakonie Katastrophenhilfe are working with civil society organisations (CSOs) and faith-based organisations (FBOs) to design, develop and enhance local level preparedness systems and capacities to support resilience building during and after crises. Local and national governments, the private sector, the media, and academia are also collaborating with the initiative, to help communities to develop their preparedness and response planning. Working with existing community structures, the initiative aims to mobilise and engage community leaders, key stakeholders, and underrepresented groups. The initiative ensures that the most vulnerable people in the community are at the heart of activities. A lack of capacity, resources and capabilities often creates challenges for local governments to initiate effective disaster risk reduction strategies and support from partners e.g. international humanitarian agencies can help to fill the gaps in the initial planning and implementation processes. Consider establishing new partnerships with international humanitarian agencies to:

• Provide institutional capacity and knowledge on emergency preparedness and response processes;
• Support the design, planning, development and implementation of projects that incorporate new initiatives which enable communities to participate and collaborate on emergency response;
• Support partners to establish local preparedness and response systems, including their own governance capacities;
• Conduct peer reviews to identify lessons learned and share examples of good practices;
• Inform future disaster preparedness and response planning

The activities in this initiative include:

• Train CSOs and FBOs on integrated disaster management. This activity aims to develop localised first response systems and capacities;
• Support and train CSOs and FBOs on Emergency Preparedness & Response Planning capacity development, including strategies for building resilience;
• Establish/strengthen 40 local voluntary community groups on areas such as community preparedness, early warning and response;
• Pilot a ‘Supporting Community-led Response’ programme which aims to enable communities and self-help groups to collaborate on response to crisis, and to address root causes of vulnerability, through workshops, peer review and lessons learned sessions

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

Many countries face multiple risks from COVID-19 and natural hazards. To combat these dual challenges consider how to:

• Integrate climate change into green recovery plans post COVID-19
• Use COVID-19 as an entry point to engage communities in preparing for other diseases that may be brought about by climate change
• Engage the local community in designing local preparedness and response plans e.g. to address COVID-related food insecurity, distribution of PPE, local finance solutions that meet the communities needs

This may include retrofitting of building to make them more efficient which supports the green agenda, jobs, economic recovery, and healthier living, while protecting them from other risks such as fire.

Local government should help the public to access public health information and consider the effectiveness of different ways that public health information is disseminated. An 'information for all' approach is needed so that those with disabilities are included. This may include translation of information into brail, use of audio information, and signed videos for the deaf community.

Local government should provide additional psychosocial support for stigmatised or marginalised groups, those with underlying health conditions, and those that may be part of a marginalised group and have a health condition (i.e. those living with HIV).