Training and Capacity Building for
Disaster Risk Reduction and Sustainable
Local Development
Background of this training
initiative
• Conceived within the framework of the
UN/ISDR in response to increasing concern
about the magnitude of disasters and their
impact on local communities worldwide.
• Being part of the capacity-building component
of the International Recovery Platform (IRP),
it also looks at post-disaster reconstruction,
and identifies recovery as one of the key
opportunities for reducing disaster risk.
• The impact of disasters on territories seriously
threatens the fulfillment of the ILO’s goal of
decent work for all –which is a key ingredient
for sustainable development.
HFA
IRP
ILO
Overall objective
To contribute to the International Strategy for Disaster
Reduction and the implementation of the Hyogo
Framework for Action (2005-2015) at the local level by
promoting sustainable local development policies and
practices through training and capacity building
processes
Target audience
Policy-makers and key players in local development
management and disaster risk reduction.
More specifically people, institutions, governmental and non
governmental organizations of civil society and cooperation
working at the local level and engaged in the promotion of more
resilient communities.
Geographical and linguistic
coverage
• The first training pilot edition in 2007 was
specifically designed for Central American region
and the Caribbean;
• As of 2008 the course targets high-risk countries in
the Americas, including South, North and Central
America and the Caribbean;
• A pilot inter-regional training offer in English
language will be launched in 2009 (blended
modality from August to December);
• Some institutions have already expressed their
interest in tailor-made training offers in English,
French and Spanish language (GTZ Pakistan, UNDP
Haïti, Civil Protection Venezuela,
CEPREDENAC/AECI Central America): this requests
have to be further explored in year 2009
Approach to the problem
• The vulnerabilities of a territory are the product of
cultural, social, economic, productive and environmental
practices and of incorrect political decisions or
administrative/institutional weaknesses that we
perpetrate through our patterns of development.
• The negative impact of disasters on local areas is
determined by the fragility of the development process.
• If we wish to achieve sustainability and harmonious
development within an area, DRR must be tackled from
the viewpoint of the practices that we implement in
building our societies.
• It must incorporate actions designed both to identify
and reduce risks that build up over time and, as far as it
is possible, to prevent the generation of new risks in
present and future activities.
Approach to the problem
• Actions aiming to reduce the risk of disasters are
processes in which strategic planning and local
law-making, the appropriate use of local resources,
the participation of key actors, prevention and
alleviation activities, emergency preparations and
management - and post-disaster rehabilitation and
reconstruction must be studied as a whole and
cannot be analysed as isolated and random factors
within development processes.
• The ITC/ILO Training Course emphasizes and
examines each one of these aspects from a view of
the whole and from a global perspective.
Approach to the problem
Mitigation
Reconstruction
Recovery
Prevention
DRR
Preparedness
SUSTAINABLE LOCAL DEVELOPMENT
Relief and
Rehabilitation
Rescue and
Humanitarian Aid
Emergency and
Response
Key topics and training units
1. SUSTAINABLE LOCAL DEVELOPMENT
2. DISASTERS, RISKS AND LOCAL RISK REDUCTION
3. STRATEGIC PLANNING AT THE LOCAL LEVEL
4. PROJECT DESIGN WITH A RISK REDUCTION APPROACH
5. PREPARATION AND EMERGENCY MANAGEMENT
6. RECONSTRUCTION FOR TRANSFORMATION
Sustainable local development
• Local development marks a different approach,
representing an alternative form of national and regional
development that marks a departure from traditional
models.
• It is based on a consideration of the area with its
institutions, its resources, its values, its culture and its
population but also its problems, weaknesses and
potentials.
• Endogenous local development is sustainable when it is
possible to achieve a balance between the economic,
political, social and environmental fields; when policies
reinforce all the elements in a balanced and joined-up
manner.
• The concept of territory can transcend a limited political
or geographical space, a given municipality or a specific
community.
Disasters, risks and local risk
reduction
• The effects of disasters on people, infrastructures,
productive systems and means of subsistence,
ecosystems etc. may vary from community or
neighbourhood level (small disasters), involve several
communities (medium-sized disasters) or even affect
great swathes of a country or region (large-scale
disasters).
• The causes and actors that determine a risk may have a
very different territorial location, far away from the
location where the disaster arises.
• Risks may be natural, but disasters are not!
• Local risk reduction is a process that must be led by
local authorities and taken on board by all actors who
play a part in territorial development.
Local risk reduction: what is it?
• Raising of awareness and education about threats, vulnerabilities and risks;
• The summoning, coordination and organisation of key socio economic actors
for local development;
• Political will and the commitment of competent local authorities and key
actors to reducing disaster risk;
• The wholesale diagnosis of the territory in all fields/aspects of development
and analyses of processes generating risk, the identification of responsible
social actors and causes contributing to the construction of risk;
• An analysis of vulnerability and threat factors (evaluation of risk) existing
within the territory and those that could arise due to new development
actions;
• The identification and prioritisation of disaster risk reduction options and
alternatives and the taking of decisions on more appropriate and realistic
solutions in view of the existing context;
• Negotiations with the actors involved or affected both within the local
environment and from other territorial levels;
• The processing of strategic plans, programmes and projects, management
and generation of resources and allocation of responsibilities;
• The ongoing monitoring and evaluation of measures and solutions and of the
environment and of the behaviour of risk factors;
• The appropriation, empowerment and training of key actors in local risk
management.
Local strategic planning and
PCM
• A systematic tool at the service of local
development;
• A creative process for managing change and local
development, through the identification and
definition of needs, objectives and priorities that
make it possible to design the best possible future
for a given territory, community or society;
• The main aim of SP is to ensure that a given social
environment is able to benefit maximally from its
opportunities and capabilities, neutralise threats
(internal and external), use strengths in its favour
and overcome weaknesses;
• Based on the Logical Framework Approach and
integrated by the Project Cycle Management;
• It implies the participation of local stakeholders and
the definition of long term objectives.
Preparation and emergency
management
• Reduce the adverse effects of the risk by eliminating
vulnerable points in the management of disasters through
plans for evacuation, allocation of responsibilities,
coordination of activities, creation of local capabilities,
allocation of the necessary methods and resources, etc.;
• Provide early warning systems so that the population is able
to take action and protect itself against an imminent danger;
• Apply effective and opportune measures through an active
and continuous process with a global plan for managing the
response and the emergency that is subject to ongoing
review and updating;
• Ensure the opportune, appropriate and effective distribution
of humanitarian aid and assistance;
• Envisage exit strategies that make it possible to move on
from the stage of the emergency and humanitarian aid as
quickly as possible to the stage of post-disaster recovery.
Reconstruction towards more sustainable
development
• Reconstruction must form part of the development and
disaster risk reduction policies that are implemented in an
ongoing manner within the society and must anticipate, plan
and reinforce the use of resources and capabilities that are
endogenous to the communities.
• Local actors must also have the following in readiness:
resource development and management plans, investment
projects and an appropriate organisation that establishes the
responsibilities of the parties involved in post-disaster
processes.
• Effective reconstruction and effective development are based
on the same basic principles.
• Local authorities and actors can take advantage of postdisaster reconstruction as a window of opportunity and one
of the best times to get rid of bad development practices
and introduce the topic of disaster risk reduction in territorial
planning, for promoting proactive and ongoing strategies to
consolidate safer and more sustainable societies.
The training experience in Latin
American
Key achievements in the region
The training experience in Latin
American
2007
• Pilot initiative for Central
America and the Caribbean
• Field activity in Nicaragua
• 25 participants/institutions
trained
• 4 Training Units (distance
learning and face to face)
• 2 Handbooks (Participants’
handbook and Theoretical
framework)
• 2 Journals (Delnet and
ISDR insight on the course)
2008
• Second open edition for the
Americas + Field Activity in
Dominican Republic
• 55 participants/institutions
trained
• 6 Training Units (distance
learning and face to face)
• 3 Handbooks (Participants’
handbook, Theoretical
framework, Project design for
SLD with DRR and CCA
approach)
• 1 Working Paper (former
participants’ projects
implemented in the field)
The training experience in Latin
American
• Participation in ISDR Regional Platform on Urban Risk (Feb 2008)
• GIS for Strategic Planning (included into the on-going course
year 2008 and to be developed through new activities in 2009)
with UNOSAT and ISDR Americas
• Workshop with local authorities associations in partnership with
FEMICA and ISDR Americas (Feb 2008) to detect concrete needs
of Central American local governments and to set-up together a
capacity building strategy on SLD and DRR
• Participation in the 14th Central American Network on
Decentralisation and Strengthening of Municipal Administration
(Guatemala, Sept 2008)
• Network of multiplier agents and focal points for training and
capacity building at the local level: peer group of former
participants for content validation, focal points in the field,
bridges to high-risk and difficult target countries, etc.