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Flooding events are set to worsen in rapidly urbanising Pacific Islands.(1) Most Pacific Island cities and towns are in low-lying areas vulnerable to more severe tropical cyclones and rising sea levels. Approaches to disaster response and recovery need to improve. This article uses four principles drawn from area-based approaches (ABAs) – people-centred responses, adaptive processes, multi-sector collaboration and reflective practice – to review urban disaster recovery efforts in Fiji, Solomon Islands and Vanuatu. Information was gathered through key informant interviews and a literature review. The research found positive examples of collaboration, locally tailored social protection mechanisms and community leadership. It also found challenges, including bypassed community structures and traditional adaptation techniques, duplication of efforts and weak coordination. The article concludes with a call to localise ABA approaches further, to strengthen people-centred disaster recovery and locally owned resilience.

There is growing recognition of the cumulative impact that converging environmental, political, social and economic risks have on the ability of cities to function in times of shocks and stresses. While many frameworks and assessment tools have been developed to assess the technical resilience of the infrastructure of cities, there have been fewer attempts to holistically understand and map all the factors that interact to potentially produce functioning urban systems, including the role of institutions (both formal and informal). Applied integrated research is needed to understand the daily functioning, vulnerability and resilience of these rapidly growing cities amid chronic and acute stresses and shocks; to also understand why and how multiple risks and protective factors converge and interact to constrain or enable cities to fulfil their core functions in times of stability and crisis; and finally to produce operationally relevant recommendations that could inform interventions.

This paper examines area-based approaches (ABAs) in urban post-disaster contexts. After introducing the main features of ABAs, the paper discusses current practice in humanitarian response, and the need within urban areas to draw lessons from urban development approaches, from which ABAs have emerged. The paper then presents lessons from research concerning the application of ABAs in relation to phases of the project management cycle: assessment and design, implementation, and monitoring, evaluation and learning. The paper ends with a brief discussion. Overall, it argues that for ABAs to be effective, they need to draw on longstanding lessons from urban development, plan for a longer timeframe for their actions than is otherwise often the case in recovery operations, and consider the need to scale up actions for wider city application.

The January 2001 earthquake that struck the state of Gujarat in India damaged or destroyed some 8,000 villages and 490 towns. In the months and years after the earthquake, many organizations undertook widespread reconstruction programmes. One such collaboration between the NGO CARE India and the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI) built 5,554 permanent houses as well as schools and community centres in 23 villages. This paper revisits 10 of the 23 villages that were partially or fully rebuilt by FICCI–CARE, 10 years after the earthquake. It finds that while the houses remain structurally strong and are mostly in use, residents’ levels of satisfaction, perception and usage are mixed. A central theme concerns the initial prioritization of seismic safety, which has sacrificed longer-term considerations of comfort, adaptability and the environment. The paper describes the houses that were built and presents findings according to structural condition, engagement in design, adaptations, house selling and perceptions of safety. The discussion presents four issues that emerge from the findings and wider research. The paper ends by proposing a simple equation for good housing, which places people’s involvement in building processes as the vital component.

This paper(1) looks at some of the winners and losers in the reconstruction efforts following the 2001 earthquake in Gujarat. It reviews some of the consequences of different approaches to reconstruction and these are illustrated by the experiences of three villages. It ends with a discussion of the lessons that are repeatedly ignored after disaster.

Recent natural disasters show that it is almost always the poorest who are worst affected. The rapidly urbanizing cities of Asia, Africa and Latin America present unprecedented concentrations of poverty, and in so doing mark new levels of vulnerability. Increasing urbanization brings new challenges to reducing the threat of disaster. Yet disasters are often ignored until they strike, when the damage has been done and relief is the only response. The situation is compounded by the separation of urban programming from disaster management. In a future context of increased urban growth, however, marked by an inevitable increase in urban disasters, new approaches that ‘mainstream’ disaster mitigation into urban development interventions at all levels are needed. Livelihood methodologies being practised by an increasing number of developmental organizations take account of the threat of disaster as intrinsic to developmental strategies. Livelihoods offer one approach that unifies understandings of both disaster management with development planning. Such an approach has major policy implications for decision makers aiming to make cities truly sustainable.

This paper presents a description of the Caqueta district in Lima and describes the methodology and research methods used. It presents the key findings of the project and concludes with a brief discussion of mitigation as a tool for urban development. The paper seeks to reinforce the key point of the project: that adherence to “top down” interventions can ignore community level initiatives and the positive inputs of other actors; also that risk reduction can be used as a tool in uniting key actors to focus on protecting livelihoods, as well as lives, in the promotion of sustainable urban development. This paper results from a recently completed project entitled “Reducing Risk In Vulnerable Communities, Lima, Peru. Phase One: Caqueta Pilot Project”. The principle aim of the project was to identify and subsequently develop, with the participation of key “stakeholders”, sustainable risk reduction measures for Caqueta, a particularly low-income area of Lima, Peru, vulnerable to landslides, earthquakes and fire.