Disaster reconstruction and risk management for poverty reduction.

• Author: Arnold, Margaret
• Position: COMMENTARIES on RECOVERY and RECONSTRUCTION

After Hurricane Katrina struck the Gulf Coast of the United States in late August 2005, and the world was shocked by the images of the thousands of victims stranded in the Superdome of New Orleans, many people asked, "How could this happen in the United States?" The images broadcast from New Orleans and other affected areas resembled too closely what we typically see in developing countries. Yet while the parallels are many, the most striking one is the impact of natural disasters on the poor. While those with the means to heed the evacuation order fled the area, those left behind were the most vulnerable: the sickest, the oldest, the youngest and the poorest. Katrina provided a grim reminder that any city can be caught unprepared for disaster, while also reminding us of the level of poverty that exists in parts of one of the world's wealthiest nations.

The tragedies that Katrina wrought upon the United States are much more common in developing countries, particularly among the poorer segments of the population. It is this undeniable link between poverty and the impacts of disasters that makes disaster risk management an integral part of the World Bank's mission to fight poverty Natural disasters are a major source of risk for poor people. However, this vulnerability also happens to be one of the most overlooked dimensions of poverty. One possible reason is that disasters have traditionally been considered a humanitarian assistance issue rather than one of development. Relief and development were viewed as two different "industries" with very separate mandates, actors and sources of funds.

This approach is being reconsidered by members of the international community, and particularly by its largest reconstruction and development investor, the World Bank. If the Millennium Development Goals are to be achieved, then the reduction of disaster risk must be addressed in an aggressive manner. This article reviews various experiences in disaster risk management, particularly those of the World Bank, explores the inadequacies of the traditional approach that has focused on reaction and recovery and looks at efforts to change the policy frameworks that attend this field.

THE WORLD BANK'S DISASTER PROJECT PORTFOLIO

The World Bank has a long tradition of supporting the disaster management efforts of its client countries, particularly in post-disaster reconstruction. In fact, "reconstruction" is literally its middle name--the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development. Beginning with the European reconstruction efforts after the Second World War, the World Bank has always played a major role in post-disaster reconstruction and recovery. Since 1980, the World Bank has approved more than $14 billion to support over 160 emergency reconstruction projects. However, this underestimates the amount the World Bank has provided in post-disaster reconstruction support, as these figures do not include amounts reallocated from ongoing development projects in the immediate wake of disasters. In these scenarios, the World Bank typically reviews the ongoing country project portfolio to see what funding can be released for emergency relief. These amounts remain under the original loan or credit agreements, and often go unnoticed in disaster lending figures. The amount of reallocated funding probably adds another 30 percent to overall reconstruction figures.

Through its development projects, the World Bank has also provided support for ex ante risk reduction investments. Nearly 390 additional projects approved since 1980 have components dedicated to mitigating the impacts of disasters. The total lending amounts of these initiatives near $27 billion. However, this figure overestimates the amount invested in pre-disaster risk reduction, as it includes the entire loan amount of projects that may include risk reduction components. For instance, a forestry project may incorporate funding to train firefighters, promote fire prevention in communities, build firebreaks, etc.

To the extent that development investments help reduce poverty and its attendant vulnerabilities, World Bank portfolios in their entirety can be considered investments in disaster risk reduction. However, as discussed in the lessons below, this will not be the case until development models actively integrate disaster risk management.

LESSONS FROM EXPERIENCE IN DISASTER RECOVERY

The organization of the World Bank's operations into distinct lending sectors has contributed to an ad hoc approach to disaster risk management for decades. Other "hard" sectors of World Bank lending, such as water, transport, agriculture, health and education, have been managed more strategically, often with sector analysis and strategies that guide project design. Other multidisciplinary topics that had also been neglected for many years, such as environment and gender, were eventually recognized as priority areas. Operations then benefited from a more strategic approach to these areas, and the development of safeguards, requiring each project design to address how these issues were handled. However, disaster risk management, while constituting a substantial portion of World Bank lending, has remained until recently an "orphan sector" that lacked strategic planning.

This began to change in 1998, when the World Bank established a central unit to focus on disaster risk management. The Hazard Risk Management team (formerly called the Disaster Management Facility) dedicated itself to monitoring the World Bank's disaster-related interventions as a sector of investment, with the aim of extracting lessons to inform future World Bank engagement in the area. The unit's objectives are to facilitate a more strategic response to disaster emergencies and to enhance the World Bank's poverty alleviation efforts by integrating effective disaster risk reduction into development activities.

The first objective in improving the World Bank's disaster emergency response focused on efforts to extract lessons from the World Bank's many reconstruction projects, and the experience of other partners. Indeed, working with external partners has been critical to tapping into the wide array of disaster risk management expertise around the globe. In 2000, the World Bank launched the ProVention Consortium, a global coalition of governments, international organizations, academic institutions, the private sector and civil society organizations dedicated to increasing the safety of vulnerable communities and to reducing the impact of disasters in developing countries. The ProVention network includes organizations involved in all phases of disaster risk management--from risk...