Anticipation Hub statement to the GPDRR 2022

A statement from the Anticipation Hub, released to coincide with the Global Platform on Disaster Risk Reduction (GPDRR),  outlines how the anticipatory action and DRR communities can work in synergy to help countries achieve their targets under the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction 2015-30. These key messages were developed in consultation with partners and are directed at governments, donors and the anticipatory action and DRR communities.

“There is increasing international recognition of the crucial role anticipatory action can play in reducing disaster risk, but to date, the approach has not been sufficiently harnessed in national climate and disaster risk management contexts,” says Dr Nikolas Scherer, policy and advocacy manager at the Anticipation Hub. “Our statement outlines what the anticipatory action and DRR communities can do to strengthen and scale up the approach so that more people affected by hazards are better able to cope with the impacts.”

The statements calls upon governments to:

• review and update disaster risk management frameworks;
• clarify roles and responsibilities in relevant disaster risk management frameworks and promote a multi-stakeholder approach;
• increase access to funding for anticipatory action;
• and promote synergies and break silos to link anticipatory action with social protection.

It calls on donors to increase and ease access to financing to scale up anticipatory action and support the integration of anticipatory action into national frameworks.

The larger anticipatory action and DRR communities are called upon to:

• build partnerships to promote national ownership and strengthen locally led anticipatory action;
• collect, share and exchange knowledge, lessons and evidence about how anticipatory action makes a difference;
• promote socially inclusive anticipatory action approaches that ‘leave no one behind;
• and be innovative to make anticipatory action applicable to a wider variety of hazards, including compound risk.

The statement is based on the policy brief published by the Anticipatory Action Task Force, and informed by the outcomes from recent regional and global dialogue platforms on anticipatory humanitarian action. It has been reviewed by participants of the GPDRR preparation event, and by more than 100 people from across the globe and the policy, science and practice spheres.