UNHCR Malawi helps flood victims to rebuild shattered lives

A press release from the UNHCR: The floods, when they came, came without warning. They were Malawi's worst in 20 years, sweeping through 15 districts in January 2015 and forcing 174,000 people to flee their
homes. Sixty-two people were killed and thousands more risked disease. Now, thanks to nearly US $600,000 from a special UN emergency fund, UNHCR Malawi has given affected populations a chance to rebuild their lives.

The UN's Central Emergency Response Fund (CERF) has enabled UNHCR Malawi to provide core relief items to 8,120 households in the worst-hit districts of Machinga, Zomba, Mulanje and Phalombe. Between May 24 and June 4 this year, kitchen sets, blankets, sleeping mats and insecticide-treated mosquito nets were distributed to thankful locals.

Women were particularly excited by the kitchen sets, having had to try and find work to raise money to buy cooking pots, plates, cups, and other household items lost in the floods.

"I was going to sell sand, but now I do not have to," one woman told UNHCR. "It would take me a very long time to recover the lost items, but this has now changed, thanks to UNHCR."

Men, too, were grateful for UNHCR's help. "The blankets and mats are just what we needed to pull through this bad weather," said one male recipient. "And the mosquito nets will safe guard against malaria."

Locator map of Malawi by TUBS, Wikimedia Commons, under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license

Balkans still recovering one year after catastrophic floods

International Orthodox Christian Charities: It's been a difficult year since record rainfall drenched the Balkans last spring, unleashing the worst flooding in more than 100 years and leaving a trail of destruction across Serbia and Bosnia-Herzegovina. More than 70 people lost their lives, while hundreds of thousands of survivors had to evacuate as family homes and farms, roads and utilities were damaged or destroyed. Relentless summer and fall rains renewed flooding, which slowed recovery and threatened to keep many families from having warm and dry shelter in time for winter.

...From its offices in Serbia and Bosnia, International Orthodox Christian Charities (IOCC) responded on the heels of the disaster, ensuring the delivery of relief to vulnerable families in the region's hardest hit communities. Through the financial support of church and private donors in the US, Australia and New Zealand, and close cooperation with local partners, the Serbian Orthodox Church and the Red Cross, IOCC's ongoing assistance has helped thousands of survivors like Ljubica and Mladen return to their homes and resume their lives. More than 800 families have received support from IOCC with cleanup, home repair kits filled with construction materials, or replacement stoves and refrigerators.

The raging waters not only damaged homes and businesses, but also swept away desks, books, computers and lab equipment from school classrooms. Schooling came to a standstill for the 950 students of Šamac. Through your support, IOCC has helped restore the learning environment for the community's schoolchildren.

...More than 1,400 schoolchildren from the Serbian towns of Kladovo and Obrenovac suffered similar losses in their communities. The only primary school in the village of Tekija near Kladovo was so badly damaged by waves of mud and debris that the entire student body has had to be bussed daily to a school in Kladovo. IOCC is taking action with the installation of a new roof and heating system to be completed in time for Tekija's children to return to their own school next fall...

NASA image of 2014 flooding in Bosnia and Serbia

Cash aid feeds business surge in northeast Kenya

Isaiah Esipisu in Thomson Reuters Foundation: When the government of Kenya began giving cash instead of food aid to poor people in Kenya's drought-stricken North Eastern region, the aim was to help them buy food more efficiently and conveniently.

But the cash-transfer programme has had an unexpected effect: Most of the recipients of the cash have used it to start small businesses, which they see as the best way of adapting to increasingly tough climatic conditions.

"We expected them to buy food, given the emergency situation. But investing the money into businesses shows how very little resources can be used to build resilience among very poor communities," said Evelyn Nadio, manager of the Hunger Safety Net Programme (HSNP), which provides the cash aid under Kenya's National Drought Management Authority.

The parched, acacia scrub regions receiving the help - including Kenya's Mandera, Turkana, Marsabit and Wajir counties - had seen huge losses of livestock as a result of drought. Many herders had lost nearly all their animals, which had been their main source of income. Today, however, eight years after the programme began, other businesses have sprung up.

At Katiko Market in Turkana Central, Akuom Idieya Katurong'ot, a widowed mother of seven, runs a retail shop and a goat slaughterhouse. She also rents a set of small kiosks built from iron sheeting. Money from the cash-transfer programme helped pay for all the new infrastructure.

Nearly 90 percent of the recipients of cash from the safety net programme have similarly opened retail businesses or used the money to restock their herds with drought-hardy goats, said Nadio....

A roadside market in Kenya, shot by Angela Sevin, Wikimedia Commons via Flickr, under the Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic license

Food concerns mount in Vanuatu after monster cyclone

Reuters: International aid agencies ramped up appeals for cyclone-hit Vanuatu on Wednesday, warning that the powerful storm that affected more than two-thirds of the South Pacific island nation had wiped out crops and destroyed fishing fleets, raising the risk of hunger and disease.

Residents of the southern island of Tanna said food and basic supplies were running low, while relief workers were still battling to reach many islands pummeled by Cyclone Pam's gusts of more than 300 kph (185 mph) on Friday and Saturday.

The United Nations said the official death toll was 11, but many officials anticipate that number will rise once they are able to more thoroughly inspect the outer islands of the scattered archipelago.

 Sweden said on Tuesday that a Swedish man aged around 80 who had emigrated was among the dead. Sune Gudnitz, Pacific head of the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, said getting food supplies to isolated communities was a concern. "The challenge of getting things out, whether it's people or goods, remains. We want to avoid creating a bottleneck in (Vanuatu capital) Port Vila, so we very quickly need to work out a plan for getting things out," Gudnitz said....

A post-Pam boat graveyard in Vanuatu, shot by Graham Crumb, Wikimedia Commons, under the Creative Commons Attribution Share-Alike 3.0 Unported license

Affrican Development Bank awards US$1 million emergency relief assistance for drought victims in Somalia

A press release from the African Development Bank: The African Development Bank Group (AfDB) has awarded US $1 million emergency relief assistance to Somalia where over one million people affected by drought and famine are in dire need of humanitarian assistance.

The Emergency Humanitarian Relief Assistance to Victims of Drought in the country approved by the AfDB Board of Directors on Monday, February 9, 2015 will support the efforts being made by the Federal Government of Somalia in conjunction with the United Nations to provide urgent food aid distributions and food deliveries to drought-affected families in several parts of the country.

The grant has been mobilised from the Bank’s Special Relief Fund (SRF) and will be used to purchase food items, finance costs of transportation and distribution of food rations to the beneficiaries as well as administrative charges.

The assistance will be channeled through targeted food distribution to households affected by the drought, mainly vulnerable groups (like widows, orphans, female- and elderly-headed households) without alternative means of survival. Due to the imminent shortfalls, local and regional purchases, which have the added benefit of supporting the national and regional agricultural economies, will be made.

...According to United Nations statistics, some 9 to 10 million people in the Horn of Africa are in need of humanitarian assistance as a result of a severe drought, whose effects have been worsened by poor rains, conflict, trade disruptions and reduced humanitarian assistance in Ethiopia, Kenya, Somalia and Djibouti. Continued deterioration as a result of severe droughts in 2010 and 2011, coupled with poor humanitarian access and inadequate humanitarian assistance, culminated in the declaration of famine in southern Somalia in 2011, with more than 250,000 people, mainly women and children dying from hunger and decease....

A goatherd in Somalia, shot by Oxfam-East Africa Oxfam East Africa, Wikimedia Commons via Flickr, under the Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic license

UNDP pledges to assist Malawi recover from floods disaster

Vatican Radio: ...Malawi is regularly hit by floods and droughts. This requires emergency responses of varying size each year. This year, according to the UN News Service, flooding has caused displacement of over 170,000 people, while an estimated 116,000 households have lost their crops and livestock. In Nsanje district alone, 79 people are confirmed dead with another 153 people still missing.

...A United Nations (UN) wide effort has been launched to support those in need and mitigate the potential risks of disease and food shortages. In addition to the important work provided by the World Food Program (WFP), World Health Organisation (WHO) and United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) in airlifting supplies and providing clean water and sanitation, United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and other agencies are poised to help in early recovery efforts.

 Ensuring livelihood, economic and social recovery – reestablishing schools such as Jimmy Mbamere’s – is crucial.

 The United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) is already planning early recovery and has put in place an adviser who will engage with the government and other UN agencies to ensure a comprehensive early recovery strategy.... 

After intense flooding, Malawi desperately needs scale-up in international aid – UN experts

UN News Centre: The international community must rapidly respond to the devastating flooding affecting Malawi with critical humanitarian aid and appropriate funding, a group of United Nations human rights experts affirmed today, warning that the African country was facing “its worst flooding in living memory.”

In a press release, the Special Rapporteur on the human rights of internally displaced persons, Chaloka Beyani, the Special Rapporteur on the right to food, Hilal Elver, and the Special Rapporteur on the human right to safe drinking water and sanitation, Léo Heller, encouraged the international community to do “everything possible to meet the current serious shortfall in funds and provision of essential aid,” especially as only a quarter of the urgently required $81 million of a Preliminary Response Plan had been received to date.

“The flooding has displaced large numbers of people and presents massive and complex challenges for Governments and their humanitarian allies in the short, medium and longer-term,” Mr. Beyani said.

“Evacuation of affected populations should be undertaken where necessary to save lives, and an effective humanitarian response is essential to address the needs of internally displaced people and others affected,” he continued. “Helping people to return and reconstruct devastated homes - when circumstances allow - will be just one challenge among many to rebuild lives and livelihoods and should be part of a broader recovery plan.”

Malawi is regularly hit by floods and droughts, requiring emergency responses of varying size each year. This year, flooding has caused displacement of over 170,000 people, while an estimated 116,000 households have lost their crops and livestock. In Nsanje district alone, 79 people are confirmed dead with another 153 people still missing...

Basket Bridge, Rumphi, northern Malawi, crossing South Rukuru river, shot by Michaelphoya, Wikimedia Commons, under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International 4.0 license

Much aid, little long-term impact in Democratic Republic of Congo

IRIN: Aid agencies have sunk hundreds of millions of dollars into eastern Democratic Republic of Congo in the past two decades. But seeing little long-term impact or prospect of stability, some are now calling for an overhaul of the way aid is delivered in the long-troubled region.

Eastern DRC has been plagued by war and instability since 1994, when thousands of ethnic Hutus, including soldiers and militias responsible for the Rwandan genocide, poured over the border from Rwanda. Conflicts over land and resources have displaced millions of Congolese, many of them repeatedly.

The UN says there were about 2.7 million internally displaced persons (IDPs) in DRC in 2014, the majority of them in the east. Aid workers are also bracing for an expected military offensive by UN and government forces against a long-standing rebel group in North Kivu that will likely prompt tens of thousands more impoverished Congolese to flee their homes.

The calls for change come just as officials in DRC’s North Kivu province press for the closure of IDP camps, and as donors cut back funding for a region whose intractable problems have been overshadowed by newer crises, from the war in Syria to the Ebola outbreak in West Africa.

...The three-year NRC project, funded bythe British government, is one of several initiatives seeking better understanding of how people experience and adapt to displacement. The research should help make aid groups more effective in helping both IDPs and host communities rebound from shocks.

Other humanitarian groups have similarly begun searching for ways to help entire communities better deal with the endless waves of violence and displacement, even as they scramble to keep the immediate victims alive....

A 2008 Danish aid delivery to Democratic Republic of Congo, shot by Julien Harneis, Wikimedia Commons via Flickr, under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 1.0 Generic license. 

World Bank supports greater resilience to climate related hazards in Mozambique

AllAfrica.com via the World Bank: The World Bank Board of Executive Directors approved today an International Development Association (IDA) financing in the amount of US$50 million to support climate change related reforms agreed upon between the Government of Mozambique (GoM) and the World Bank under the Climate Change Development Policy Operation (DPO). This operation will improve the country's resilience to effects of climate change through the implementation of reforms across several sectors of the economy.

Extreme climate related events such as cyclones and floods have devastating effects on agriculture, electricity generation, mining, and transport and communications almost every year in Mozambique.

The country ranks third in Africa in terms of exposure to climate-related hazards and is the only country in Africa considered to be at high risk from each of the major climate hazards - droughts, floods and coastal cyclones. Economic losses average 1.1 percent of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) annually, having cost US$1.75 billion between 1980 and 2003.

The country's GDP fell following the 2000 floods from a forecast of 7 percent to 1.5 percent and the 2013 floods in the Limpopo Valley alone inflicted damages to affected settlements and infrastructure in the order of US$135 million and losses in crops estimated at US$112 million.

The 2013 floods also resulted in at least 44 reported direct fatalities, 170,000 people evacuated in Gaza province alone, and a high prevalence of water-borne diseases and malaria amongst affected populations, most of whom were extremely poor. The floods severely damaged transport, irrigation, water supply, urban drainage, sanitation, and private assets, further disrupting private sector activities....

US Air Force photo of a flood in Mozambique in 2000

Central America drought turning into humanitarian crisis

UN News Centre: A prolonged drought in Central America is turning into a humanitarian crisis for nearly two and a half million people affected by food insecurity in Honduras, Guatemala and El Salvador, the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) warned today. Briefing the press in Geneva today, OCHA’s Jens Laerke said most of those affected are subsistence farmers, farm labourers and low-income families.

In Honduras and Guatemala, up to 75 per cent of maize and bean crop has been lost and thousands of cattle had died. In the coming months, food insecurity is expected to get worse as families deplete their food stocks.

In Guatemala, the Government declared a state of public calamity in 16 departments in August and by October, 30,000 families had finished their food stocks. Those families were today in deep distress, said Mr. Laerke.

In the so-called “dry corridor” in eastern Guatemala, a joint Government/UN/NGO (non-governmental organization) assessment found that one in four households suffered from moderate or severe malnutrition. Children under five, pregnant women and female-headed households are most vulnerable, said Mr. Laerke.

In Honduras the Government had declared a state of emergency in the drought affected western areas, as crop loss had reached up to 75 per cent. Assessments also found high levels of malnutrition in children under five. An emergency assessment in September found that nearly 20,000 children were malnourished as a consequence of the long drought, said Mr. Laerke.

In El Salvador, the Ministry of Environment and Natural resources had reported that the country was experiencing its worst drought since 1977. The authorities said that in hotspot areas in the eastern part of the country, more than 80 per cent of farmers reported that they have lost all of their crops....

The Guatemalan highlands, shot by Pati Gaitan Pati Gaitan, Wikimedia Commons via Flickr, under the Creative Commons 2.0 license

India rushes water aid to thirsty Maldives to take a lead over China

Shubham Ghosh in One India: India rushed to maritime neighbour Maldives' rescue after receiving a distress call from Male which faced a massive water crisis after its main water treatment plant was damaged in a fire. New Delhi sent 200 tonnes of potable water by air and water ways.

Maldives conveyed its plight to foreign minister Sushma Swaraj through her Maldivian counterpart Dunya Maumoon that the capital was in a state of emergency as 1,00,000 residents were left without a drop to drinking following the fire at the treatment plant. Maldives has no natural source of water and depends on treated sea water. Swaraj immediately took up the matter with Prime Minister Narendra Modi and New Delhi wasted no time to use the opportunity to strengthen its ties with the maritime neighbour. Foreign ministry spokesperson

Syed Akbaruddin said India was the first country to stand by Maldives at its hour of need and reiterated that India would help any member of the Saarc fraternity in all possible way. It may be mentioned here that Prime Minister Modi has stressed improving South Asian solidarity on all platforms, including the recent Saarc Summit held in Nepal. The prime minister also assured Maldivian President Abdulla Yameen about India's help and expressed hope about further progress in the relation between the two neighbours.

Maldives also sought help from Sri Lanka, China and United States. Former Maldivian presidents Mayoom Abdul Gayoom and Mohammed Naseed thanked the Indian government for aiding their country at the time of the crisis....

UN report urges more funds for climate change adaptation, warns on temperature rise

UN News Centre: Despite public funding of climate change adaptation measures reaching as high as $26 billion in 2012-2013, a new United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) report predicts a significant funding gap after 2020 unless new and additional finance for adaptation is made available.

The first UNEP Adaptation Gap Report finds that even if global greenhouse gas emissions are cut to the level required to keep temperature rise below 2°C, the cost of climate change adaptation in developing countries is likely to reach two to three times the previous estimates of $70-100 billion per year by 2050.

“Debating the economics of our response to climate change must become more honest,” said UNEP Executive Director Achim Steiner in a press release on the challenges ahead, released as the first week of UN climate talks in Lima, Peru wrap up. That conference is set to conclude its work on 12 December.

“As world leaders meet in Lima to take the critical next step in realizing a global agreement on climate change, this report underlines the importance of including comprehensive adaptation plans in the agreement.”

The report assesses global adaptation gaps in finance, technology and knowledge, and lays out a framework for future work to better define and bridge those gaps. It calls for further action to cut emissions to prevent adaptation costs from soaring as wider and more-expensive action is needed to protect communities from the intensifying impacts of climate change...

A panorama of Naajaat in northwest Greenland, Image shot by Slaunger and stitched together by Herbythyme, Wikimedia Commons, under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license

Tanzania needs over $1 billion for climate change

East African Business Week: The government has established that it needs massive financial support to the tune of over $1 billion annually by 2030 coupled with technological support to address climate change adaptation, a feature also approved by the Tanzania technological needs assessment 2010.

The technological support includes concrete actions on adaptation consistent with the NCSS commitment by the international community both through the convention process and bilateral engagement to support national efforts for climate resilient economic growth.

Richard Muyungi of the Vice President’s Office United Republic of Tanzania said last week that about 8% of the land area of Dar es Salaam 140,000 people and economic assets worth more than $170 million are below the 10m contour line in potentially vulnerable areas, with 31,000 people considered at risk.

“By 2030, without adaptation, this will increase to more than 100,000 people and over $400 million assets and rise further in later years. We are worried because large proportion of GDP is associated with climate sensitive sectors, particularly agriculture whereas rainfall decreases by up to 15% and there is no adaptation average maize yields could decrease by up to 16% by 2030 a loss of around 1 million tonnes a year and 25 - 35% by 2050 equivalent to 2 to 2.7 million tonnes per year,” Muyungi affirmed...

A 2011 flood in Dar es Salaam, shot by Muddyb Blast Producer at Swahili Wikipedia, Wikimedia Commons, under the Creative Commons 3.0 license

New global disaster reduction strategy must include vulnerable people

Jessica Hartog at the Thomson Reuters Foundation: Last week, international experts on disaster reduction met in Geneva to develop a new global framework to make the world more resilient to increasing natural disasters.

It is clear that disasters such as earthquakes, typhoons and floods are on the rise and have huge impacts. The U.N. Office for Disaster Risk Reduction (UNISDR) estimates that in the last 20 years, 1.3 million people have been killed by disasters. Of these deaths, 93 percent were in developing countries, highlighting how the poor are disproportionately vulnerable to disasters.

But there is more to the story than mortality rates. In the last 20 years, around 4.4 billion people have been affected in some way or another by disasters.

For people whose assets have been damaged or destroyed, farmers whose harvests have been lost, or communities whose road infrastructure has been damaged - cutting them off from their work, schools and markets -  economic losses are thought to have totalled $2 trillion in the same period.

It is expected that disasters will only continue to increase if we do not take measures to stop this trend. Major drivers are climate change and the growth of cities in areas that are already exposed to floods, tropical storms and earthquakes. This is why an internationally agreed disaster risk reduction strategy is so important....

From the 2010 flooding in Thailand, shot by Napast3379, Wikimedia Commons, under the Creative Commons 3.0 license 

Central African Republic faces insecurity, logistics challenges as rains set in

UN News Centre: Due to the rainy season in the Central African Republic (CAR), the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) has announced that it is facing a double challenge of insecurity and logistical constraints.

“Heightened insecurity in some areas of the country has resulted in postponed or halted distributions by the WFP and other organisations due to the volatility of the situation,” explained WFP spokesperson Elisabeth Byrs.

Recently, significant security-related events occurred in central parts of the country – particularly within the Bambari-Sibut-Dekoa area. Ms. Byrs elaborated, “There have been substantial movements of armed elements to and from Bambari and rumours of strategic attacks from one militia gro
up, triggering counter attacks from other elements in these areas. Insecurity also remains in Batangafo and Boda.”

In total, six primary and secondary at-risk axes were identified in the west, central and north of the country. “In the past three months, overall nationwide incidents related to access had increased by 38 per cent,” Ms. Byrs informed. Despite those challenges, WFP had distributed 4,800 metric tonnes for approximately 400,000 people in August, corresponding to 95 per cent of planned distributions for the month.

A consignment of 40 KAMAZ trucks – one of the world’s largest vehicles – were currently on their way to help deliver life-saving food to hundreds of thousands of hungry people in the Central African Republic. Russia donated the trucks, valued at $2.7 million, to WFP’s Afghanistan operation. In 2013, Russia contributed $50 million to support agency operations in 18 countries....

NASA image of Bangui in the Central African Republic

Reduced rains affect food security in Kenya

AllAfrica.com via the UN World Food Program: Below average rains, increased food prices and conflicts, have contributed to a 15 percent increase in the number of people requiring food assistance. A Long Rains food security assessment recently released by the National Drought Management Authority (NDMA) estimates that 1.5 million people are acutely food insecure and will require immediate food assistance over the next six months (September 2014 - February 2015). This is almost double the 850,000 that were in need during the same period last year.

With the peak of the lean season yet to set in, and the next rains expected in mid-October, the food and nutrition security situation will likely worsen, prompting the need for urgent response. The poor rains resulted in below-average crop production and weak recovery of rangeland conditions.

In pastoral and agro pastoral areas, forage conditions were fair to poor with 70 percent to 80 percent of ground water sources reported to be exhausted. The current areas of concern include parts of Turkana, Marsabit, Wajir, Mandera, Samburu, Baringo and West Pokot. In the Arid areas the large majority of counties have general acute malnutrition (GAM) rates that are critical (>15%) or very critical (>
20%) and this is a significant deterioration compared to last year.

WFP is currently providing general food distributions (GFD) to 530,000 people in Kenya. That number will rise based on the current situation. WFP is also providing cash and food assistance to 700,000 vulnerable people in order for them to build assets at household and community levels which enhance their resilience to shocks. Support focuses on rainwater harvesting for crop and livestock production, rehabilitation of degraded land, and increased production of drought-tolerant and high value cash crops....

Yarey Abdi iIobe lives in Shabantaabaq village, without rain for two and a half years and about 80% of the cattle have died. The village population has almost doubled in recent months with an influx of families arriving in search of food and water: "My husband is old and he cannot eat the grains. We need something soft like milk but it is no longer available. Here are quite a number of families in the village who are malnourished. Without the aid we are getting we would be dead." Photo by Oxfam East Africa, Wikimedia Commons via Flickr,  under the Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic license

USAID, Rockefeller launch $100 million climate resilience fund

Thin Lei Win in Reuters, via the Thomson Reuters Foundation: A $100 million fund launched on Tuesday aims to make people in disaster-prone regions of Asia and Africa better able to cope with natural disasters and crises, so that they can get their lives and economies back on track more quickly and effectively.

The Global Resilience Partnership (GRP) set up by the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) and the Rockefeller Foundation will focus on South and Southeast Asia, the Sahel and the Horn of Africa, where typhoons, floods, earthquakes and drought destroy lives and jobs and hamper development.

Scientists say climate change could bring more frequent and more intense weather-related disasters. If communities become more resilient, disaster recovery and relief efforts will cost less, and people will be able to reduce the disruption to lives and jobs and avoid falling into destitution.

“Both USAID and the Rockefeller Foundation see resilience as a vital framework to help alleviate poverty, promote more sustainable development and lessen the impacts of disasters,” said Michael Yates, director of the USAID regional mission in Asia.

The GRP’s first project is the Global Resilience Design Challenge, a multi-phase competition to be launched in September at the USAID Frontiers in Development Forum in Washington, D.C....

Japan to assist with disaster risk reduction training in Latin America and the Caribbean

Continuity Central: On July 31st 2014, the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) signed a Memorandum of Cooperation for the ‘Disaster Risk Reduction Training Program for Latin America and the Caribbean’ with the Chilean International Cooperation Agency (AGCI).

The Memorandum of Cooperation will enable JICA to assist with disaster risk reduction training in Latin America and the Caribbean.

Through the combination of Japan and Chile’s disaster management resources, the program is designed to efficiently and effectively develop human resources with a high level of specialization, as well as to improve the capacity of government officials to respond to actual disasters. The program also aims to build a regional network for sharing experiences and knowledge from other Latin America and the Caribbean countries....

Donor support to Sahel "anaemic"

IRIN: More donor support is needed to help close the US$1.5 billion funding gap in the Sahel this year and protect the livelihoods of the estimated 20.2 million people who are at risk of food insecurity. Only 30 percent of the $2.2 billion appeal to fight hunger and malnutrition, and build resilience in the region has been met by donors as of July, according to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA).

"The funding for the whole effort is what I would characterize as pretty anaemic," said Robert Piper, the UN regional humanitarian coordinator for the Sahel. "We are well short of what we require, and to make the task even more difficult, the budget has increased since the beginning of the year."

Due to the influx of refugees from the ongoing crisis in the Central African Republic into neighbouring Sahel countries, an additional $200 million was added to the initial appeal to provide life-saving assistance to the more than 2.4 million refugees, internally displaced people and returnees now living in the region, as well as the host communities taking them in.

"Outside the usual recurring situations in the Sahel, the conflict in CAR and northern Nigeria is quite worrisome this year, as are the collateral effects in neighbouring Chad and Cameroon," said Stephane Doyon, a regional emergency response representative for Médecins Sans Frontières. "The refugees have lots of needs, which are additional needs to be met. "...

A 2005 shot of a refugee camp in Chad, shot by Mark Knobil, Wikimedia Commons via Flickr,  under the Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic license

Drones spread wings from war zones to disaster areas

Tony Mohr in SciDev.net: While lawmakers around the world struggle to keep up with the growth in the use of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) — commonly known as drones — innovation and community participation are changing how this weapon of modern warfare can be used for humanitarian purposes.

At a conference on UAVs in Australia (23-24 July), Patrick Meier, an international consultant in the field of conflict early warning and crisis mapping, noted that these remotely piloted aircrafts are bringing communities together to collect, analyse and use UAV data to prepare for natural disasters such as floods, hurricanes and landslides.

After Super Typhoon Haiyan struck the Philippines in November 2013, UAV projects helped in the relief efforts but they were uncoordinated and the data generated were not shared with affected communities, Meier noted.

To improve coordination in the use of UAVs, Meier co-founded the Humanitarian UAV Network (UAviators) to bridge humanitarian efforts and UAV groups internationally. The network has drafted a code of conduct on the responsible use of UAVs in humanitarian settings. It plans to roll out training and certification courses in the first half of 2015.

...He explains UAVs are now being used to create 2D and 3D maps of disaster-affected areas with more detail and in less time than is possible through satellites. “Aid and assistance can be deployed when and where these are needed because of such mapping,” he tells SciDev.Net....

IAI Heron 1 UAV in flight Location: NAVAL AIR STATION, FALLON, NEVADA (NV) UNITED STATES OF AMERICA (USA). From Department of Defense media