1.0 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
Based on the literature review commissioned by the HC, this discussion paper aims to provide recommendations for Canada-based humanitarian agencies and donors looking to improve their involvement in urban-based humanitarian responses.
The Literature Review focuses on the lessons learned, best practices and common challenges for urban shelter, WASH and livelihoods interventions during the Typhoon Haiyan response. As such, the recommendations presented both reinforce learning and best practices found by similar review exercises, and include new perspectives that aim to spark discussions amongst Canadian actors for future urban humanitarian responses.
The focus of the Literature Review is on responses that occurred within existing cities or towns under the authority of a municipal government. These urban areas are typically characterized by a growing population living and working within a fairly dense and contiguous built form and local “urban” economy under a municipal government responsible for the provision of public infrastructure and services. As a general observation, within the post-disaster context, urban areas experienced higher rates of population growth resulting from induced displacement and rapid urbanization in the form of urban infill (ie., formal or informal occupancy of previously vacant or underutilized land) or peri-urban extensions (ie., formal and informal occupancy of lands on the perimeter of urban areas). Moreover municipal governments and urban populations have a much higher exposure to risk due to disaster-induced damage and displacement and the resulting administrative, financial and capacity strain on public infrastructure and services and due to lack of protections, basic needs and opportunity within the emerging post disaster context. Considering this uneven distribution of risk, many of the main recommendations focus on municipalities (as the governance framework and service provider) as a critical focal point for improving humanitarian response outcomes including increased urban resiliency and disaster risk reduction.
The main recommendations in this paper are divided into two categories – policy recommendations and recommendations for operational agencies.
Policy Recommendations include:
Recommendation 1: Set the stage for early recovery from the outset by using an integrated, incremental “relief to recovery” approach for program design.
1.1 Agencies should plan for early recovery from the outset of a response by integrating the necessary
flexibility into program design through the use of incremental strategies that effectively link relief and
recovery activities.
1.2 Agencies should include housing, land and property rights as a central element of any “incremental
approach” to relief and recovery in urban area from the outset.
1.3 Agencies should use planning tools such as community and regional plans to assess, analyze and respond to the greater effects of post-disaster relief and recovery interventions.
Recommendation 2: Provide sufficient flexibility in emergency response funding mechanisms to enable humanitarian agencies to develop integrated, incremental, “relief to recovery” programming.
2.1 Donors should provide sufficient flexibility in emergency response funding mechanisms to enable implementing agencies to adapt programming where necessary based on updated, urban appropriate needs assessments, situation and response analyses.
2.2 Donors should provide sufficient flexibility in emergency response funding mechanisms to enable implementing agencies to adapt and develop integrated, cross-sectoral programming that strengthens existing municipal services as part of first phase response. This includes capacity building of municipal departments and the use of integrated and/or area-based approaches.
2.3 Donors should provide increased funding for recovery efforts that involve participatory planning efforts and partnerships between local government, local civil society and affected communities.
Operational Recommendations Include:
Recommendation 3: Adopt cross-sectoral, neighbourhood, or area-based approaches when
implementing responses in densely populated urban contexts
3.1 Implementing agencies should plan responses to displacement so they reflect beneficiaries’ new contexts and sense of place post-disaster, integrating essential and secondary services so that sectoral activities support, reinforce and multiply one another’s impacts.
3.2 Agencies should make more use of geographically focused targeting methodologies when implementing responses in dense urban environments, as part of an integrated area-based approach.
3.3 Agencies should adapt existing assessment and program design tools so they better reflect the
complexities of the urban environment, needs of host and displaced populations and capacity of municipal service providers to respond.
3.4 Agencies should integrate sectoral programming with cross-cutting livelihoods strategies reflective of preexisting regional and local urban economies and the emerging reconstruction economy.
Recommendation 4: Establish partnerships with municipalities and local authorities to plan for, and deliver, integrated “relief to recovery” interventions from the outset of humanitarian operations – even prior to emergencies.
4.1 Agencies should work in partnership with municipalities and local authorities to plan for interventions by aligning first phase response plans with essential public services and infrastructure, as well as identifying challenges this will engender for recovery assistance.
4.2 Agencies should strengthen existing municipal services and local infrastructure as part of first phase response. This may include capacity building and systems support for the municipal departments, civil society and/or private sector actors responsible for the delivery of essential services such as water, waste management, transportation, and health among others.
Recommendation 5: Include participatory planning approaches for community design in relief and
recovery interventions in urban areas; including incremental approaches to land tenure, housing
and infrastructure.
5.1 Agencies should facilitate an open, accessible, participatory community planning process that incorporates communities and the local government into shared decision-making regarding organization of the public realm (services and infrastructure).
