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Making Cities Resilient – My City is Getting Ready!
Essential 8: Environmental Protection and Strengthening of Ecosystems “Protect ecosystems and natural buffers to mitigate floods, storm surges and other hazards to which your city may be vulnerable. Adapt to climate change by building on good risk reduction practices.”
Ecosystem-based management considers the whole ecosystem, including humans and the environment. It focuses on natural environmental units such as watersheds, wetlands or coastal ecosystems (and the human communities that live within them or rely on their resources). It recognizes pressures from societal needs and excesses and seeks to promote patterns of land and resource use that do not undermine the core ecosystem functions and services that city dwellers rely on.
Why? Ecosystems serve as protective buffers against natural hazards. They increase the resilience of communities by strengthening livelihoods and the availability and quality of drinking water, food supplies and other natural resources. Through the process of urban expansion, cities transform their surrounding environment and often generate new risks. The urbanization of watersheds can modify hydrological regimes and destabilize slopes, increasing hazards such as floods and landslides. Maintaining a balance between human actions and ecosystems is an excellent strategy for reducing risk and contributing to resilience and sustainability.
What? Raise awareness of the impact of environmental change and degradation of ecosystems on disaster risk • Recognize and communicate the multiple functions and services that ecosystems provide to a city, including natural hazard protection or mitigation. • Educate the public about the negative consequences of global warming and climate change.