Catalog of Learning Activities

WBI Program: Urban
Activity Title: NIDM-WBI Community Based Disaster Risk Management Course
Activity ID: URD10-00-105
 

Contact Info

Task Manager: Katalin Demeter
Email: KDemeter@worldbank.org
Task Admin: Berna Yekeler
Email: byekeler@worldbank.org

Date and Cost

Start Date: January 04 2010
End Date: January 31 2010
Cost: No Fees

Description

This course is a joint offering of National Institute of Disaster Management, New Delhi and World Bank Institute, Washington. The human causes of natural disasters find greater recognition today in the theory and practice of disaster management, and there is a discernible shift in the nature of disaster preparedness and mitigation activities. While governments, supported by other actors—international agencies, academia, and non-governmental organizations—play a key role in organizing and funding disaster management programs, the content and implementation of these initiatives now include communities as prime actors. This approach has evolved in the last two decades. It is based on the recognition that the socio-economic vulnerability of communities, rather than physical hazard, explains the impact of disasters and that interventions must therefore aim at reducing vulnerability at the community level. Successive disasters in different parts of the world have demonstrated time and again that the impact of a disaster in terms of life, assets, and potential for recovery is borne disproportionately by developing countries, and within them by the poorest segments. A community-based approach aims to reduce their socially constructed vulnerability by involving communities as active participants in a disaster program. There is also a broadening consensus that it is cost-effective to train and educate communities about risks they face, provide them access to resources and knowledge, and to develop community-based preparedness and mitigation programs. This approach has emerged as a complement to structural mitigation (dams, dykes, levees, etc.) and even certain types of non-structural mitigation programs (land use, building codes, development regulations, etc.). A community-based disaster risk management program does not follow a standard course of action or a master plan. Instead, it is a series of action plans that allow methods to be less normative, procedures less standardized and intervention mechanisms more innovative and improvised. The key issues are creating access to resources for protecting shelter and livelihoods, greater knowledge and choices for hazard mitigation, and reducing socio-economic vulnerability.

Objective

The objective of this course is to introduce the concepts, tools, and mechanisms, which help design and implement community-based disaster risk management programs. The course highlights the flexibility and innovation required for these community-based initiatives. Further, it underscores the need for greater engagement with people and a better understanding of their risks and resources.

Topic(s)

Urban Development

Participants

Audience: This course is offered to local government officials, policymakers, consultants, researchers and professors of training institutions, who are interested in development challenges and issues related to natural disaster risk management.

Target Country(s): India

Partners: NIDM

Site Information

Delivery Modes: Electronic Learning (40 Hours)
Locations:New Delhi, India
 Languages: English