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Disaster
preparedness tools: Vulnerability and Capacity Assessment
(VCA) |
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Vulnerability and Capacity Assessment (VCA)
uses various participatory tools to gauge people’s exposure
to and capacity to resist natural hazards. It is an integral
part of disaster preparedness and contributes to the creation
of community-based disaster preparedness programmes at the
rural and urban grass-roots level. VCA enables local priorities
to be identified and appropriate action taken to reduce disaster
risk and assists in the design and development of programmes
that are mutually supportive and responsive to the needs of
the people most closely concerned.
The aims of VCA are to:
- assess risks and hazards facing
communities and the capacities they have for dealing with
them;
- involve communities, local authorities
and humanitarian and development organizations in the
assessment from the outset;
- draw up action plans to prepare
for and respond to the identified risks;
- identify risk-reduction activities
to prevent or lessen the effects of expected hazards,
risks and vulnerabilities.
VCA is complementary to national and sub-national
risk, hazard, vulnerability and capacity mapping exercises
that identify communities most at risk. A VCA is then undertaken
in these communities to diagnose the specific areas of risk
and vulnerability and determine what action can be taken to
address them. To complete the circle, what a VCA unearths
at the local level can provide a valuable indication of national
and sub-national vulnerabilities and capacities. The International Federation’s experience
over the last ten years has enabled it to refine and improve
VCA to make it better focused and more effective in achieving
its purpose. It has also shown how VCA can be linked to and
reinforce other Red Cross Red Crescent programmes and activities.
Moreover, as VCA is a participatory process, National Societies
can develop realistic and relevant activities that are better
suited to local needs and priorities.
As one National Society
member said after undertaking a VCA:
“Before, we used
to work for people, but now we work with them.”
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National
Society experiences with VCA |
- Nepal: Dealing with local hazards
In Nepal, after conducting a VCA-type process, the National
Society worked with villagers to create community-based
programmes to deal with local hazards such as flooding.
The participatory nature of the process and the difference
that people were able to make through their own actions
helped them to realize that disasters were something they
could influence and as a result they have become less fatalistic
about risk.
- Yemen: Unexpected outcome
In 2005, the Yemen Red Crescent Society carried out a VCA
in two districts badly affected by flash floods. The assessment
turned up some surprising findings: over the past 15 years,
more people have been killed in road accidents in Yemen
than as a result of flooding. The National Society therefore
initiated a road safety programme designed to reduce such
accidents, especially near schools, which has been much
appreciated by the local population.
- Solomon Islands: Improved community
relations
Since the 1940s, the relationship between two distinct groups
in one of the Solomon Island coastal villages had been affected
by land disputes. The two groups had lived and worked in
separate and different ways until August 2004, when the
Solomon Islands Red Cross decided to carry out a VCA. The
process brought the two communities together and gave them
a forum in which to communicate.
During one of the VCA meetings to discuss the construction
of a drainage system, which both communities had identified
as essential, a representative of one of the groups acknowledged
the importance of community youth development and invited
the two communities to work together to improve living standards
and to help their young people. As a result, elders and
young people from both groups became closely involved in
VCA activities.
The VCA process was a landmark event for the communities’
youth, who expressed a keen interest in cooperating with
other community VCAs and in developing a local Red Cross
group in 2005.
- Priorities in the Caribbean:
Strong roofs v. kitchens
In a number of Caribbean countries, National Societies undertook
a programme to strengthen roofs against hurricanes. Many
of the intended beneficiaries, however, gave a higher priority
to improving their kitchens. To outsiders this might seem
to be courting disaster, but for local people it was more
pressing to relieve the daily struggle to cook and perform
household chores than to withstand a hurricane that might
not arrive for many years. The National Societies agreed
to help local people improve both their kitchens and their
roofs.
- Rwanda: Using local expertise
While seeking to address food insecurity, the Rwanda Red
Cross conducted a VCA in which it divided out the various
topics of discussion according to local expertise. The elderly
were assigned history, with special emphasis on problems
relating to food security; women focused on the seasonal
calendar and the daily work routine; and young people produced
a map of the sector showing community development achievements.
- In Rwanda, women are usually the ones
who tend the fields and take care of the children. They
know a great deal about their land and the daily difficulties
and obstacles that they face. The women’s group, therefore,
started by drawing up a seasonal work calendar in order
to pool their collective experience.
The discussion centred on the best crops to grow and revealed
that, for example, production of coffee had slowed after
several dry seasons – even though the income generated
from coffee production was far higher than that from growing
vegetables. The group highlighted the need for washing stations
where the coffee beans could be properly treated and sold
at current market prices as one way of reducing the community’s
vulnerability to food insecurity.
“We had never thought in this
way about how we live and grow food. We had never taken
the time to visit our neighbours, even if they didn’t
live nearby, to ask them when, why and how do you do that.
We grow this variety rather than that one because…”
VCA participant.
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Find
out more |
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Documents available:
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Disaster management
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