Exercise 4: Vulnerability matrix
In this exercise, participants develop a matrix that lists the resources and assets most important to the community’s livelihoods against the hazards prioritized in Exercise 3. Participants then evaluate the level of impact of the hazards. The objectives of the exercise are to:
Identify the community’s most important resources and assets
Identify the vulnerability of the assets and resources to the hazards
Determine which assets and resources are most at risk
Determine which hazards are most harmful to the resources and assets
This exercise builds on the hazard map, the seasonal calendar and the prioritization of hazards from Module 2.
Facilitation A list of resources and assets in Annex IV provides a basis for discussion, but every community is different, and the list is intended only as a prompt.
In order to be manageable, the total number of identified resources or assets should not exceed 20.
22 Vulnerability assessment
As in the hazard map and seasonal calendar exercises, facilitators provide pencils or markers in multiple colours and sheets of paper at least 80 cm x 100 cm in size. Facilitators prepare these sheets in advance in a matrix (see example below). Facilitators ask the participants to identify the main livelihood assets and resources in each of the categories listed below.
Natural resources on which people rely for income, food, medicine, protection, fuel and other sustenance – forests, water, air and soil, for example
Physical resources – infrastructure for transport, water management, energy and communications such as roads, hospitals, dwellings and water tanks
Economic and financial resources such as income from the sale of agricultural products and handicrafts, casual work and remittances
Social resources such as local councils, churches, cooperatives, trade unions and family
Human resources – the skills, knowledge, capacity and good health important to the pursuit of livelihoods, including agricultural and leadership skills and gender-specific knowledge
Module
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