Recovery, Renewal, Resilience

Recovery and renewal strategies require community co-production to be influenced by the knowledge, skills and experience of communities. Participation depends on a number of factors. VFL find that time and convenience are crucial when it comes to community participation in recovery, renewal and resilience plans and actions. Measures to facilitate community participation should address the needs of all community members, so as to ensure accessibility, and not reinforce inequalities. Consider whether:

• Local planning and government meetings, forums and workshops are conveniently located and accessible:
  • Select locations and venues that facilitate access for all members of the community. Consider access constraints affecting disadvantaged groups, which may be physical, geographic, economic, or faith related. E.g. provide online access, transport, refreshments, accessibility for people with disabilities
  • Select venues/online forums where different groups within the community already congregate (e.g. different religious groups, women)
• The timing of activities fits with the commitments of the community members who will be participating. For example, work schedules, household responsibilities, school timetables of children and parents (particularly women), farmers' seasonal calendars:
  • Carefully consider people's time, and seek feedback from the community on times that are suitable
  • Draw on appropriate local volunteers to offer childcare where physical meetings are held
• Socio-cultural issues which might prevent some people from participating have been considered:
  • Identify potential barriers related to language, literacy levels, ethnicity, gender discrimination, etc.
  • Provide expert facilitation and translation services, or organize separate meetings with women, people with disabilities, specific ethnic minorities and other groups to facilitate their participation
• Report back to participants on the outcome of their community participation and how thinking/planning has changed as a result of their contribution

Views from the Frontline (VFL) found that many communities feel that they would benefit significantly if they were to be included in the planning, preparing and monitoring of disaster risk interventions. Communities, and the people within them, are acutely aware of their vulnerabilities and will have diverse needs and priorities. By including the community in the development of plans and actions, local governments can recognise these diversities and directly respond through policies and interventions. Further, inclusion and co-operation can increase a community's awareness of the valuable resources that are available to them before, during and after disasters. Consider:

• Facilitate regular interaction of local government with communities and grassroots organisations in decision-making processes and disaster risk reduction programmes:
  • Establish community consultations/workshops
• Engage and involve local stakeholders in the preparation of local policies, plans and actions aimed at disaster risk management:
  • Ensure the adoption of an inclusive approach when doing so, e.g. including volunteers, marginalised people (women, children, people with disabilities, migrants, older people, LGBTQI+)
• Collate knowledge and ideas, and generate collective action between local government and communities on what is required to address different types of disaster risk:
  • Collaborative knowledge sharing and action can mitigate threats, address vulnerabilities and improve the community's sense of security and safety
• Involve local knowledge of communities to improve risk mapping, generate local ownership and empowerment, and increase awareness and preparedness:
  • In Tanzania, local residents carry out remote detection to identify sanitation issues in rural areas by sending SMS messages to local engineers and media outlets
  • This raises the awareness of local people quickly to potential risks and enables local authorities to monitor water supplies remotely and at a lower cost