When does response end and recovery begin? Exploring preparation and planning to support community’s resilient recovery

This research project explores areas in which resilience practitioners’ (RPs) and emergency responders’ (ERs) can influence on a community during a Natural Hazzard Emergency (NHE), and how this affects a community’s capacity to recover. This is important because a community’s ability to effectively recover from impacts of an NHE has implications for that community’s future resilience, and its ability to adapt to the effects of climate change. In this report the influence of RPs and ERs on a community’s capacity to recover is examined.

Twelve mechanisms were identified through which ERs and RPs can affect a community during the response to an NHE (pp. 41-46). Five successful strategies taken from academic literature (pp. 28-38), which have helped communities to recover in the aftermath of an NHE which A) contribute to a community’s future resilience to NHEs and B) support communities to adapt to climate change, are analysed and summarised. The characteristics of the mechanisms and successful strategies with the potential to be incorporated into NHE response preparation and planning by ERs and RPs are given. The report, concludes with a summary of the findings (p. 52) and a list of recommendations (p. 53).