Institutions for Risk and Financing Prevention

Risk Prevention 

We have paid considerable attention to the role of the public sector in disaster risk management. However, as with all development strategies, a multi-stakeholder approach that engages the community is most effective for disaster prevention.

Private enterprises could be recruited to sponsor mitigation measures in basic services. For example, the occurrence of flooding can be reduced by ensuring that flood plains are not built upon by private developers, protecting wetlands, and constructing levees along the river banks. 

Private and public measures need to work well together – for example, residents in low-lying areas of Jakarta raise the plinth of their houses to protect against floods; however, since public provision of piped water is inadequate, they also dig bore wells that causes the ground to subside. 

Research institutions can target public education about mitigation to low-income communities and creating positive incentives to encourage private sector and community participation. Community oversight can be crucial. Vibrant communities help ensure that trees are not thoughtlessly felled and that saplings will grow. Even if the interests of uplanders who cut the trees may diverge from lowlanders who get flooded, communities in dialogue bridge these differences and manage the fair use of the commons.

Further, the existence of institutionalized political parties is significantly associated with reductions in disaster mortality, since such systems are more likely to respond to citizen’s needs.

Financing Prevention

Just as prevention strategies are not obvious, finances for prevention are not obvious as well. It is important to recognize that the development goals of a country and the existing funds used to target the MDG build disaster resilience. Apart from the mainstream development funds, funds for disaster prevention are available for risk reduction in specific sectors. For example, the Climate Finance under the aegis of UNFCCC includes:

• International Funds: Adaptation Fund, World Bank Carbon Partnership Facility for preparing CDM projects and monetizing CERs, Climate Investment Funds: The Clean Technology Fund for scaled up demonstration, deployment and transfer of low-carbon technologies, The Strategic Climate Fund for Climate Resilience in core development, Forest Investment Program, Program to Scale up Renewable Energy for Low Income Countries, urban planning support, Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation programs (REDD+), GEF, GFDRR, International Development Association, IBRD, and CMDB.
• Bilateral core funds for adaptation and mitigation.
• National programs such as Hatoyama Initiative (Japan), International Climate Initiative (Germany).
• Trust Funds and Partnerships, and Guarantees for knowledge products, capacity building, partial risk guarantees to support development, adoption and application of clean energy technologies.
• Climate Insurance products for risk financing strategy development, MultiCat products, CAT swaps for extreme flood risks etc., and multi-city insurance products.
• Climate Bonds against city CERs or Nationally Appropriate Mitigation Action and monetizing carbon funds.
• IFC and other MDB private sector arms for climate resilient infrastructure or low-carbon technologies. (Source"WB")