Disaster Risk Management (Vulnerability and Capacity Assessment) - Essay Example

The techniques like Vulnerability and Capability Assessment (VCA) would be very effective in identifying local perceptions about the disaster and also in the evaluation of the capability of the community to face during such an catastrophe. Either well structured means - qualitative, quantitative or their combination or unstructured and participative methods could be used for proper identification of interrelationships of the local settings. The utility of using VCA for identification and quantification of vulnerability besides measuring the regional capabilities has been widely accepted.

Among the various methods often adopted for undertaking the VCA process, the participatory methods have had considerable success when compared to other means of identifying the exact factors involved in most issues. When a calamity or the disaster strikes a region, the impact of these events are borne by the entire population and hence the potential of vulnerability of entire cross section of the people need to be mapped to understand the magnitude of effect. Also, the perception of the people towards these events which could be frequent would also help the policy makers and support agencies to prioritize the action process.

Even in the cases considered the though the common problems perceived in the regions were water shortage. The local community in these countries not only have different perceptions on the risks but also anticipates different type of problems they might have to face due to this. Further , variation in the type of demographic profile and socio-political conditions might make all bureaucratic approaches to identify the priority programme ineffective.As in the case considered, Palestine a small country involved with continuous military interventions with the neighboring country Israel is said to have very poor infrastructure facilities like roads, power supply and also water and waste water management systems.

A well structured VCA analysis, conducted using local community and organizational systems, to identify the potential hazard facing them into various aspects of the country have revealed interesting facts. The techniques adopted had a blend of different methods like interviews, focus group discussions, workshops besides separately involving children also. The method had given rich information that have helped to map the vulnerability in the region and also in the identification of their capability.

Further, local level workshops to create a base awareness to help them to generate opinions and remarks too shows the extended mechanism present in these approaches for information generation. Similar approached were adopted in the case of Afghanistan to assess the issues of food security and in the identification of potential hazards in the countries like Albania and Vietnam. In addition to identification of vulnerability spots in the society they would also help the decision makers to identify and envisage the future course of action very effectively.

The regional strength of in all the cases considered in the analysis have been identified and ranked appropriately. This would help to identify the prevailing dogma in the region which other wise would have hindered the success of any developmental initiative. Also as assessment of the capability of the people and systems in these places