Update

Indonesia's National Disaster Mitigation Agency has announced that there will be classes on disaster mitigation at 250,000 schools located in disaster-prone areas. The classes will either be integrated into the curriculum or through extracurricular activities and, unlike previous efforts, anyone can administer them, not just ministry staff.

A new UNESCAP report analyses the impact of disasters on SIDS and maps out the impact on a cluster of SDGs. While the Pacific SIDS are heavily reliant on ocean resources, most of the disasters that affect them are oceanogenic. To build resilient SIDS, there is a need to connect the dots - science, geospatial data, statistics, and policy interfaces.

A religious leader in the Philippines has said that during the post-Typhoon Yolanda recovery, more than 30,000 families have benefited from the Catholic Church's PHP 3.2 billion rehabilitation and reconstruction program. The program is one success amid several innovative accomplishments that have helped the Church implement its recovery projects.

Many rural Tongan women are tackling the various challenges wrought by this year's Cyclone Gita - one of the worst storms to pass Tonga in 60 years - with hard work and leadership. With the help of UN Women, they are responding to the needs of the community, self-mobilizing and connecting with the private sector to secure resources.

Much—perhaps too much—has been made of Filipino resiliency. While government programs are important for redrawing the conditions under which they labor, their success hinge precisely on people’s ability to respond to and recuperate from their misfortune.

Caritas Palo Director Fr. Al Cris Badana emphasized the importance of the involvement of the communities in addressing climate change and disaster risks knowing the impact of super typhoon Yolanda that wrought havoc to the people in areas affected.

On November 8, 2013, Super Typhoon Haiyan, one of the strongest tropical cyclones ever recorded, disrupted the lives of nearly six million children and destroyed the homes of 1.4 million children and their families. Two years on, UNICEF continues to help children, families and communities rebuild their lives...

Leonor Briones, president of Social Watch Philippines, a public spending watchdog, said the slow release of the 167 billion pesos ($3.6 billion) earmarked by President Benigno Aquino had caused a lot of problems for local authorities. Delays in finding rehousing sites, slowness in the release of promised funds, and difficulty finding what the money has been spent on are among the problems, officials say...

Extreme loss and survivor guilt after the Typhoon Yolanda (also known as Typhoon Haiyan) disaster have led to depression in at least one in 10 people in Tacloban City, write Jed Alegado and Angeli Guadalupe in an opinion piece on IPS News. But two years after the disaster, some survivors remain unaware of available mental health services...

UN Special Rapporteur on the human rights of internally displaced persons urged the Philippines to speed up completion of housing for thousands made homeless by typhoon Haiyan nearly two years ago: "Many families remain housed in collective 'bunkhouses' that do not meet necessary minimum standards for the provision of basic needs and services." ...