"Dawn, and as the sun breaks through the
piercing chill of night on the plain outside Korem it lights up a biblical
famine, now, in the Twentieth Century. This place, say workers here, is
the closest thing to hell on earth."
Michael Buerk, BBC Correspondent,
24 October, 1984
Top-line messages:
- Vulnerable people must be the
primary partners of humanitarian actors. Solutions that are imposed are
rarely sustainable. The people themselves know the risks that they face;
the role of humanitarians is to support and guide them.
- Intensified efforts to reduce
disaster risk can dramatically lessen the impact of disasters and help
avoid chronic hunger. Such an approach also protects developmental gains
that can so easily be undermined by disasters and chronic hunger.
- Disaster risk reduction is cost
effective. Much less money is required to increase agricultural productivity
or to support people to prepare for disasters than to run relief operations.
- Emergency assistance will continue
to play a crucial role, but it needs to improve. We need to be more proactive.
We need to use early warnings that can inform decisive early action. Science
can help us to do this - can help us link disaster response and risk reduction.
Climatologists and meteorologists are already showing how.
- We urge the donor community to better
support Red Cross Red Crescent efforts that are designed to bridge disaster
response, recovery and development.
- Much more investment must be
made tostrengthen people's capacity and initiate sustainable solutions.
The International Federation calls on donors to dedicate a significant
proportion of the funds they spend on disaster response to risk reduction
and community-level development.
- Investment must also be made in strengthening
local Red Cross Red Crescent and other civil society capacity. Stronger
National Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies - organizations that are
able to creatively and proactively address and reduce vulnerability -
are key allies in national efforts to alleviate poverty and drive development.