Preparedness for Early Recovery
Print this pageWhy is Preparedness for Early Recovery Important?
Humanitarian assistance is vital to reducing loss of life and suffering. However, emergency relief is not designed to address the underlying causes that resulted in the disaster, nor does it automatically stimulate rapid and sustainable recovery. In some situations, post-disaster relief efforts may even exacerbate the underlying causes of vulnerability and increase risk.
Previously, reconstruction was often conceptualised and designed to return a disaster-affected community to pre-existing disaster conditions. This often led to rebuilding the conditions of risk that existed before the disaster, thus preparing the ground for future disasters. Recently policy makers and practitioners have begun to look beyond replicating the pre-disaster situation of communities. It is increasingly recognised that closer integration of early recovery activities with life saving interventions can lead to more sustainable interventions that will reduce risk while simultaneously accelerating the recovery process.
How to Incorporate Early Recovery into Preparedness Planning?
It is vital that skilled people with experience in early recovery are included during the development of a preparedness capability. Successful early recovering planning will require the participation of a wide range of actors including:
- Relevant Government Ministries, including potentially some additional departments responsible for developmental initiatives;
- Government local authorities in zones of high disaster risk;
- Finance, planning and infrastructure departments;
- Public and private service utilities (electricity, water supply etc.);
- Local NGOs and community based organisations in the identified high risk zones;
- Private businesses located in the high risk zones;
- Associations of professionals such as engineers and architects;
- Media networks;
- Participation by authorities from provincial to local levels who would have executive authority for planning and implementing post disaster recovery and reconstruction plans; and
- Finance and budgeting authorities so that they could earmark contingency resources for disaster recovery upfront.
Integrating early recovery into contingency planning can help strengthen community resilience to hazard events. This should include measures to reduce immediate risk, for example by locating shelters for displaced populations outside of flood-zones or in areas at lower risk from future hazards. It should also include actions to reduce threats to livelihoods and assets that will strongly impact a community’s ability to recover after a disaster.
Discussions should begin well in advance of a hazard event about how quickly ‘emergencyEprojects to provide basic services such as food, healthcare and education will give way to more transitional, or developmental interventions. Having these discussions early on can potentially lead to more sustainable and effective interventions and can minimise the use of temporary emergency supplies. Activities more compatible with longer-term recovery (such as cash for relief projects in the immediate aftermath of a disaster) may also want to be considered during the response phase to enable populations to retain their assets and livelihoods as far as possible in the wake of a hazard event.
Useful Resources for Early Recovery
Guidance Note on Early Recovery: by the Cluster Working Group on Early Recovery, in cooperation with the UNDG-ECHA Working Group on Transition. This guidance note is designed primarily for UN colleagues and partners working at country level on early recovery in natural disasters and complex emergencies. Specifically, the guidance aims to: 1) help practitioners understand the particular complexities of early recovery environments, and appreciate the diverse range of actors involved in planning and implementing early recovery activities; 2) establish some basic guiding principles and minimum standards of intervention for early recovery; 3) provide tools and resources for practitioners working on early recovery across a range of functions; and 4) set the stage for an effective handover to longer-term recovery processes.
Cluster Working Group on Early Recovery (CWGER): more information on the CWGER can be found on the HumanitarianReform.org website, under Clusters/Sectors --> Early Recovery
Joint Initiative on Recovery Coordination: The UNDGO/UNDP-BCPR/OCHA Joint Initiative on Recovery Coordination (JI) is an informal effort which seeks to ensure continuity and predictability in coordination support throughout the recovery period.
OCHA intranet page on Recovery and Transition provides useful information for policy updates on early recovery. Two policy coordination mechanisms, one for OCHA internal and the other among UN agencies, are currently put in place.
OCHA Transition Working Group: OCHA Working Group on Recovery and Transition (OTWG) is a temporary mechanism aimed at ensuring an internally coordinated approach to Recovery and Transition and enhancing OCHA’s impact in relevant initiatives.