Contributions to a Comprehensive Strategy Design for Disaster Risk Reduction Related to Extreme Hydroclimatic Events in Latin America and the Caribbean

Abstract

This article summarizes the experience and the main results of a regional comparative research carried out during 2017 at the request of the Inter-American Development Bank. This study was carried out by the Research Center for Disaster Risk Reduction (CIGIR) with the purpose of identifying financial strategies for reducing the risk of disasters associated with the occurrence of floods and debris flows in the particular context of Latin America and the Caribbean. The article starts with a description of the high levels of disaster risk associated with extreme hydroclimatic events that have been identified for the region and with a very brief description of the impact that some disasters of this type have left in several countries. Subsequently, the conceptual foundations of the approach to the comprehensive management of socio-natural risks—with which most of the countries of the region have been trying to advance in their efforts to reduce the impact of disasters on their development processes—are described. The results of a comprehensive and regionally relevant strategy for disaster risk management associated with torrential avalanches and floods are subsequently presented. A strategy was designed based on the consultation of about 50 experts from 14 countries to highlight the need to work simultaneously in five large areas of intervention, where a total of 25 specific priority actions are identified as actions that must be attended in order to reduce the regional impact of this type of disaster. Finally, the results of an assessment of the levels of comprehensiveness of the efforts being made by the various countries of the region in order to reduce the risk of hydroclimatic disasters are shown. The starting point of this final analysis is the detailed review of the individual efforts that regional countries have been reporting in their national reports of advances to climate change adaptation (NDC) and that has been presented within the framework of the Paris agreement COP21. The results of this analysis suggest the importance of continuing to work on the design and adequate implementation of comprehensive agendas to reduce the risk of hydroclimatic disasters in societies such as those in Latin America. Societies in which their particular political, institutional, and sociocultural practices define so strongly the patterns of occupation and the sustainability of the development efforts are promoted in their territories.