IPCC_Managing Risks of Extreme Events.pdf - Climate Access

National Systems for Managing the Risks from Climate Extremes and DisastersChapter 6Box 6-6 | National Disaster Preparedness, Prevention, and Management Systems: China and KenyaChinaThe Government’s disaster management process, developed as National Integrated Disaster Reduction, is a comprehensive system bringingtogether a number of central and local government sectors and covering the different phases of disasters preparedness, response, andrecovery/rehabilitation. China has put in place over 30 laws and regulations regarding disaster management. The Emergency ResponseLaw was adopted on 30 August 2007, as the central legal document governing all disaster-related efforts in China.Under the related law and regulations, the Government has established an emergency response system consisting of three levels:• The National Master Plan for Responding to Public Emergencies – a framework to be used throughout government to ensure publicsecurity and cope with public emergency events, including all disaster response activities.• Five national thematic disaster response plans that outline the detailed assignment of duties and arrangements for major disasterresponse categories – disaster relief, flood and drought, earthquakes, geological disasters, and very severe forest fires.• Emergency response plans for 15 central government departments and their detailed implementation plans and operation norms(UNESCAP, 2009).KenyaThe government is working toward a national disaster management policy with the intention of preventing disasters and minimizing thedisruption they cause through taking steps to reduce risks. The policy will help enhance existing capacities by building resilience to hazardevents, building institutional capacity, developing a well-managed disaster response system, reducing vulnerability, and ensuring thatdisaster policy is integrated with development policy and poverty reduction and takes a multi-sectoral, multi-level approach. The Ministryof State for Special Programmes will be responsible for the coordination of the disaster management policy, will promote integrationand coordination of disaster management, and will establish a national institute for disaster research to improve systematic monitoringand promotion of research.The draft policy published in 2009 stressed the central role of climate change in any future sustainable planned and integrated NationalStrategy for Disaster Management. It sets out principles for effective disaster management, codes of conduct of different stakeholders, andprovides for the establishment of an institutional framework that is legally recognized and embedded within the government structures.It stresses the importance of mobilizing resources to enable the implementation of the policy, with provision of 2% of the annual publicbudget to a National Disaster Management Fund.At the time of writing, this policy has not reached Parliament for discussion and approval (MOSSP, 2010).in times of disaster. These pose significant challenges and involve acombination of direct delivery and advocacy. Across all four categoriesof response, there are challenges around resources availability,proportionality of distribution, coordination, and leadership (ALNAP,2010a).Box 6-6 outlines details of the disaster management systems of twocountries, which were chosen to illustrate the different stages ofdisaster management development that are evident across states.Although level of response and actors involved can vary considerablybetween disasters and countries (ALNAP, 2010a), the basic actionstaken to manage disaster impacts remain broadly the same acrosscountries, and correspond closely to the different stages of the disastertimeline (see Table 6-4; Coppola, 2007). In general, disaster managementemploys immediate humanitarian activities, needs assessments, and thedelivery of goods and services to meet requirements. The demand forwater, food, shelter, sanitation, healthcare, security, and – later on –education, employment, reconstruction, and so on is balanced againstavailable resources (Wisner and Adams, 2002).Despite the existence of evidence that climate change is not responsiblefor the vast majority of the increasing trend in disaster losses (see SPMand Section 4.5.3.3), climate change-related disasters are still widely, ifincorrectly, seen by particularly the humanitarian community as playinga major role in increasing the overall human impact of disasters.Numerous trends in disaster events are commonly attributed to climatechange (IASC, 2009a; IFRC, 2009), and, as such, climate change is oftencited as a reason for enhancing both national and international disastermanagement capacities (HFP, 2007; Oxfam, 2007; IASC, 2009a,b).Consequently, climate change-related considerations are increasinglyfeaturing in literature on disaster management (Barrett et al., 2007;374