Afghanistan’s rural communities have low resilience to hazards and climate change, which is further exacerbated by conflict, poverty and environmental degradation. Consequently, each year approximately 250,000 people are affected by hazards such as droughts, floods, landslides, avalanches, earthquakes and extreme weather events.
Besides the provision of emergency aid to address urgent humanitarian needs, preparatory actions taken before hazards strike reduce the negative impacts of such hazards on lives and livelihoods. Such actions – known as disaster risk reduction – require thorough knowledge of the local context to understand how diverse actors and factors can be mobilised to reduce vulnerability and exposure to hazards.
This Hazard and Climate Vulnerability and Capacity Assessment toolkit was developed by UN Environment and the Afghanistan Resilience Consortium to equip development practitioners, community leaders, and decision-makers with a framework for collecting and analysing data to better understand the underlying causes of vulnerability to hazards and climate change in rural Afghanistan. This will provide the foundation for disaster risk reduction actions to build resilience and better prepare Afghanistan’s rural communities do cope with hazards and climate change.
The information collected through this Hazard and Climate Vulnerability and Capacity Assessment toolkit is designed to be used in conjunction with the Community-Based Disaster Preparedness toolkit for comprehensive action to enhance adaptive capacity at the local level.
