18 / Global Facility for Disaster Reduction and Recovery (GFDRR)
Bringing Together the Five Pillars of Action in the Philippines In the greater metropolitan Manila area, around 12 million people—accounting for a fifth of the country’s total population—fuel the country’s economy, generating close to 40 percent of its GDP. Despite its role as the Philippines’ economic engine, Manila lacks sufficient plans and infrastructure to protect the people and assets that are perennially affected by flooding.
In response, the Philippines government and GFDRR put in place a flood risk management master plan that prioritizes policy reform and investments costing approximately $9 billion. The government has approved the plan and its price tag, with an initial allocation of $120 million for immediate and critical investments. Studies have begun on a plan that proposes structural—or engineered—changes in the Upper Marikina River catchment area, upstream of Metro Manila, and the Laguna Lakeshore, and the government is in discussions with nearby communities on new housing and resettlement options. GFDRR’s improvements to risk assessments are informing new land use regulations, watershed conservation, and reforestation, and are improving the Philippines’ flood forecasting and warning system. While floods are the primary threat, Manila also lies near seismic fault lines, so GFDRR conducted a flood and earthquake risk assessment to help the government make smarter investments in public infrastructure. As a result, this study is informing the design and construction of the government’s new wastewater treatment plants in Manila. The Department of Public Works and Highways, the Department of Health, and the Department of Education have partnered with GFDRR and the World Bank to make 200 critical public buildings like schools and hospitals in Manila safer and more resistant to multiple hazards. Meanwhile, the Philippines continues to suffer from the financial shocks that disasters can cause. In order to reduce the government’s fiscal burden, GFDRR is supporting the Department of Finance to develop a national risk financing strategy. In FY13, a catastrophe risk modeling produced a historical catalog of natural
disasters for the country, including the metropolitan Manila area, as well as a database of their consequences to people, infrastructure, and the economy. This important momentum created by the Philippines’ commitment to disaster risk management has also meant that the country is struggling to meet new, legislated requirements. For example, there is an urgent need to increase human and financial resources dedicated to disaster risk management. With GFDRR support, the country’s Earthquake Megacities Initiative, a nonprofit organization, offered a series of courses on the latest innovations in disaster risk reduction. In 2012 alone 500 disaster risk management practitioners took the course. Other countries are now emulating and scaling up this training. GFDRR’s work in the Philippines provides an example of what can be accomplished when government, partners, financing, and a necessary sense of urgency all come together. The Philippines has made real progress in integrating disaster risk management into its national development plan, resulting in prioritized investments as well as policy and institutional reforms to reduce future risk. Most importantly, the country has recognized that disaster risk reduction entails the whole of government and society in order to protect precious development gains.
A little girl does her schoolwork in a Philippines evacuation center set up following the devastation caused by Typhoon Ketsana, which made landfall there on September 25, 2009. In FY13, GFDRR and the government made solid advances in disaster risk management and recovery measures. Photo credit: Jerome Ascano/World Bank