Features
Roundtable Discussion on Disaster Risk Reduction Held
(SILANG, Cavite, Philippines - February 27, 2010) - A roundtable discussion on Disaster Resistant Sustainable Livelihood Framework and Decentralized Disaster Risk Management by the International Institute of Rural Reconstruction and Practical Action-Sri Lanka was held February 23, 2010 at IIRR’s Yen Center with about twenty-five participants from different non-government organizations, the academe and government agencies working on climate change and DRR. The discussion focused on the centrality of securing livelihoods in any disaster resistance work.
Dr. Isaac Bekalo, President of IIRR, presented an overview of the Institute’s work on Community Managed Disaster Risk Reduction, or CMDRR. Dr. Bekalo stressed that CMDRR places communities or villages at the center of the process in building resilience to and responding to natural and man-made hazards.
Mr. Lauro Monzon, Head of the Provincial Disaster Coordinating Council of the Provincial Government of Cavite, also shared their program on disaster management and preparedness which includes setting up community-based early warning systems and building local capacity on disaster response.
One of the program highlights was a presentation by Ms. Madhavi Ariyabandu, Regional Program Officer of the United Nation International Strategy for Disaster Reduction, entitled “Integrating DRR at the Local Level.”
Ms. Ariyabandu stressed that local level governance institutions must actively take the lead on DRR wherein participation of communities, their institutions, the private sector and other stakeholders is crucial. She added that localizing DRR means a bottom-up planning approach to understanding the hazards-vulnerability scenario in order to come up with DRR strategies and significantly affect the existence of local level partnerships to influence decision making that is central to participatory methodologies to facilitate multi-stakeholder responsibilities.
Ms. Ariyabandu also presented the challenges in integrating DRR at the local level which includes low awareness and understanding of development and DRR by the community; the local authority (LA) considered mostly as an implementing /service provision arm of government; gaps in implementing decentralization; weak institutional arrangements to obtain community inputs at LA level; weak community organization to provide inputs to local level decision making; political difference and lack of trust between community and LA; and capacity and resource availability to carry out disaster sensitive development, especially with multiple expectations.
Mr. M.A. Jayantha R. Gunasekera, Team Leader, Markets and Livelihoods Programme of Practical Action-Sri Lanka then gave a presentation on “Disaster Resistant Sustainable Livelihood Framework and Participatory Market System Development Approach”.
Mr. Gunasekera shared that Practical Action’s approaches to livelihood development and disaster risk reduction includes Disaster Resistant Sustainable Livelihood (DRSL) frame work and Participatory Market System Development.
He further shared that the DRSL is a livelihood centered approach to DRR wherein it looks at the inter linkages between disaster risk, poverty, and livelihoods and lastly it is guided by DFID’s Sustainable Livelihoods Framework.
In Practical Action experience of DRSL framework in Duryog, Nivaran in Sri Lanka, DRSL utilizes technology systems like roof water harvesting, ground water harvesting; disaster sensitive farming practices and crop varieties; community based access road construction and community based constructions of minor irrigation channels and flood mitigation structures.
It also utilizes processes and approaches like local seed production and delivery systems; land use planning at village level; community based natural resource governance; promotion of agricultural research and innovation as a measure of adaptation to climate change.
After the presentations, the participants were then grouped and discussed the level of implementation of the Philippines in terms of integrating DRR at the local level and disaster resistant sustainable livelihood frameworks. They were also asked what has been the role so far of the communities in the process.
The result of the RTD proves that there has been little effort so far in integrating DRR at the local level where they are mostly still engaged in disaster management and disaster preparedness. Some of the participants claimed that they are already integrating DRR into livelihood and enterprise but it’s not explicitly called DRR.
In summary, Dr. Julian Gonsalves, Senior Advisor of IIRR, asserted that livelihood security is a key to disaster risk reduction. He added that livelihoods are influenced by the state of environment (natural resources management) and the relevance and the presence of enabling environments. Livelihood-centered approaches to DRR assume that asset building, diversifying livelihoods, increasing the skill base to provide long term resilience and enhanced recovery is crucial. He further stressed that there is a need to do more to increase community capacities to conduct assessments, to plan locally, to access local government resources and to advocate for attention at the local level. In doing all of this, Dr. Gonsalves reiterated that communication is crucial and building a culture of prevention must be looked into as a knowledge-intensive business where strong local organizations are important and direction is needed towards this purpose.
Participating organizations included the Philippine Rural Reconstruction Movement, Asian NGO Coalition (ANGOC), Southeast Asia Regional Institute for Community Empowerment (SEARICE), Center for Disaster Preparedness Foundation, Inc., ChildFund Philippines, Office of the Provincial Agriculturist, Provincial Disaster Coordinating Council (PDCC), Office of the Provincial Government of Cavite, PAMANA-DCF , Peace and Equity Foundation (PEF), Philippine Partnership for the Development of Human Resources in Rural Areas (PhilDHRRA), Philippine Social Enterprise Network (PhilSEN), Southeast Asian Regional Center for Graduate Study and Research in Agriculture (SEARCA), TEBTEBBA, UNICEF and IIRR.
View this story and photos here on IIRR’s Posterous blog.
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