EA ST ASIA AND PACI FIC REGIO N
Sustainable Development                                                                           1
                                                                                      Guidance Note




GENDE R AN D D I S AST E R RISK MA N AG E ME NT - G U I DA NCE NOT E S      65833

                              Making Women’s Voices Count
                              Addressing Gender Issues in
                              Disaster Risk Management
                              in East Asia and the Pacific
                                          Making Women’s Voices Count - Addressing Gender Issues in


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WHAT IS DISASTER RISK MANAGEMENT?
WHERE DOES GENDER FIT?


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Governments around the world have committed to take action to reduce disaster risks, and have
adopted a guideline to reduce vulnerabilities to natural hazards, called the 2005 Hyogo Framework for
Action (HFA).




                                                                                      THE WORLD BANK
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                                                                         Disaster Risk Management



Gender perspective is considered a cross cutting issue of the HFA.                                     -

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social, and economic effects of natural disasters.

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REASONS TO ADDRESS GENDER ISSUES IN DISASTER RISK MANAGEMENT

Disaster impacts are often not distributed uniformly within a population, due to existing socio-eco-
nomic conditions, cultural beliefs and traditional practices.




There are costs associated with ignor-
ing gender aspects in disaster recovery    Percentage of Women killed as a result of major disasters
and risk management strategies.            across Asia




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There are many reasons why more women are disproportionately impacted and even lose their lives
as a result of a natural disaster,
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Guidance Note
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    Perception of women’s capabilities and their participation in Lao PDR and Vietnam




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A gender sensitive DRM approach takes both women’s and men’s different needs, constraints and
opportunities into account throughout the whole project cycle,                              -


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Women and men’s different perspectives on disaster risks affect how emergency preparedness, plan-
ning and post-disaster recovery programs are designed and carried out.




                  Table 1: Selected factors related to gender that can affect
                              disaster experience and resilience
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    Guidance Note
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                                                                   Disaster Risk Management




WHAT CAN BE DONE? CHALLENGES AND OPPORTUNITIES FOR MAINSTREAMING GENDER ISSUES
IN DISASTER RISK MANAGEMENT PROGRAMS
There are many opportunities to further integrate gender considerations in post-disaster response
and risk reduction initiatives in EAP.




Projects face a number of key bottlenecks when integrating gender issues into DRM programs.




     Good Practice:
     Indonesia: Reconstruction of Aceh Land Administration System (RALAS) project




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                                                                 Guidance Note




     Table 2: Summary of the key challenges and recommendations to
         improve mainstreaming of gender issues in DRM projects


    Key challenges                   Notes   Recommended approach

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                                                                       Disaster Risk Management




KEY STRATEGIES AND RECOMMENDATIONS



     Strategy #1: Proposals, policy documents, plans and all associated literature should use gender
     terms as appropriate,
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     Strategy #2: Ensure that both men and women are equally (or as close to equally as possible)
     represented at planning and consultation sessions.                                         -


     Strategy #3: Identify a gender champion and train more women leaders to institutionalize
     gender-equal project planning, implementation and monitoring initiatives.

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    Key recommendations to bear in mind when designing disaster risk management programs include:

     Recommendation #1:                                                                             -

     Recommendation #2:
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     Recommendation #3:

     Recommendation #4:
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Disaster Risk Management
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CONTACTS:




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        ender equality
            as smart economics
            A World Bank Group Action Plan
                                             Global Facility for Disaster Reduction and Recovery