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particularly the community disaster preparedness training to conduct vulnerability and capacity<br />
assessments, involves community members in the development of the tools which they will<br />
subsequently use to reduce the community’s vulnerability to disasters. The approach includes<br />
community identification of the perceived risks and capacities to generate a vulnerability maps<br />
and early warning systems.<br />
The Building Disaster Resilient Communities (BDRC) Project being implemented in Jamaica<br />
has engaged, and continues to engage, stakeholders in defining their own problems and<br />
solutions to inform project design and implementation. For example, community training<br />
programmes are developed based on capacity needs that community members have identified.<br />
e) Establishing or working with existing local governance mechanisms in communities<br />
The success of community-based programmes depends, in part, on good governance systems.<br />
The BDRC project in Jamaica is working with and through local government and parish<br />
structures. Jamaica’s 14 local authorities and their Parish Disaster Coordinators are an<br />
important element of the project’s implementation arrangements, with key activities and some<br />
local level decision-making being done in association with and through them. Indeed, working<br />
with the guidance, buy-in and at the pace of personnel at this level has proven to be a critical<br />
factor in the smooth and uninterrupted roll-out in communities.<br />
The Red Cross National Societies are another important institutional mechanism for the roll out<br />
of DRR and CC programmes at community level. They have recently been placing greater<br />
emphasis on community level disaster preparedness, testing and applying different methods to<br />
support and implement local level interventions. As a consequence they add to the<br />
effectiveness of regional and national disaster management systems, whilst ensuring they are<br />
informed by, and are more responsive to, community needs and situations of vulnerability.<br />
The governance mechanism at the level of the community itself is also critical. In CANARI’s<br />
experience, it is almost always preferable to work with an existing community-based<br />
organisation than to try and establish a new one as the results tend to be evident earlier and<br />
prove more sustainable. However, whether the organisation is an established or a new one,<br />
there is likely to be a need for initial and ongoing identification and management of internal<br />
community conflicts (generally requiring an external, independent facilitator) and capacity<br />
building in aspects of organisational and project management. This has implications for the<br />
timeframe of any successful initiative and, in practice, there is often a mis-match between short<br />
donor project funding cycles and the desired long-term outcomes, resulting in disappointment<br />
for all.<br />
CANARI has found the use of mentors to be a particularly successful strategy in supporting the<br />
development of community-based organisations, particularly in the early stages when they may<br />
be developing proposals and implementing projects for the first time. It is also important to<br />
consider all the options available for structuring the organisation, rather than relying on the type<br />
of traditional, hierarchical structures with highly formal meetings that have been prevalent in the<br />
region and that tend to deter the participation of key stakeholders such as young people (and<br />
particularly young men) and those with low literacy levels or low self-esteem or confidence. If<br />
the initiative intends to have an entrepreneurial component, a for-profit or cooperative<br />
organisation should be considered as an alternative or adjunct to a non-profit structure.<br />
f) Participatory monitoring and evaluation of community vulnerability and capacity<br />
Participatory monitoring and evaluation (PME) involves the local community, development<br />
agencies, local authorities and other stakeholders in measuring the progress made, and<br />
identifying necessary follow-up actions to ensure that community vulnerability is consistently<br />
reduced. No programmes in the region fully include this component. The Asian Disaster<br />
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