Reducing risks related to natural hazards, health crises, and climate change

Context

Small island developing states, which account for 29% of UN member states, are the most vulnerable to natural disasters and the effects of climate change. Signatories to the Samoa Declaration (2014), they have united to bring a common voice to the international stage to draw attention to the fact that natural disasters are one of the main factors destabilizing communities in the three basins of the South-West Indian Ocean, the Caribbean and the South Pacific.

In the South-West Indian Ocean zone, over ten million people have been affected by natural disasters in the last ten years. The lack of preparedness on the part of populations is constantly increasing the number of people affected by natural disasters. These high-intensity disasters compromise access to health, education and food security in the majority of countries in the region, which face structural development problems (poor development of infrastructures and public services, landlocked markets, etc.) and common strategic challenges linked to insularity.

Project description

The 3 Oceans program aims to strengthen the humanitarian operational capacities of 13 National Red Cross Societies (Haiti, Antigua & Barbuda, Dominica, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent & the Grenadines, Mozambique, Tanzania, Comoros, Madagascar, Seychelles, Mauritius, Vanuatu, the Solomon Islands and the French territories of Martinique, Guadeloupe, French Guiana, Reunion, Mayotte, Wallis and Futuna and New Caledonia) in terms of adequate storage, stock management and deployment processes, replenishment, quality control, coordination, etc., in order to better respond to disasters and the urgent needs of those affected.

Through its Regional Intervention Platforms, the French Red Cross decentralizes project implementation in each ocean basin. Each Regional Intervention Platforms operates in its own geographical area:

  • PIROI (Indian Ocean): based in Reunion Island
  • PIRAC (Americas – Caribbean): based in Guadeloupe
  • PIR South Pacific: based in New Caledonia

Start sate : January 2019

End date : December 2023

Duration : 5 years

 

Areas of intervention :

Project objectives :

  1. Integrate natural and health disaster risk management into the strategies and operations of key players.
  2. Better prepare to respond to natural and health disasters.
  3. Adapt the community-based and school-based disaster risk management approach to the context of small island states to identify best practices and improve advocacy.
  4. Develop, consolidate, capitalize on and share innovative approaches/tools to strengthen stakeholders’ capacities.

 

This project is being implemented with the support of Agence Française de Développement.