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Community Resilience and Disaster-Related Displacement in South Asia

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World
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NRC
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1. EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

This report examines the resilience of communities in South Asia to disasters and the displacement they cause. It considers their risk landscape and resilience capacity in Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, the Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka. The research analyses the multidimensional risks communities face, their assets, and the institutional and legal frameworks in which they operate. It considers communities’ capacity to prevent displacement, their ability to mitigate protection risks during displacement and their options in terms of durable solutions. The report offers a resilience building framework that incorporates common principles, while retaining flexibility and adaptability to communities’ specific risk environments.

Countries in South Asia face a range of disasters and natural hazards in the form of torrential rains, tornados, cyclones, earthquakes, drought and famine. The observed effects of climate change include risks that threaten lives, food security, health and wellbeing, and that trigger displacement.

The region is home to the world’s largest population of poor and malnourished people, and several countries are politically fragile or in transition. South Asia has undergone rapid economic growth over the past decades and significant improvements in human development have been made, but the region’s vulnerability to disasters has the potential to undermine these advances.