Mr. A.R. Subbiah, Director, RIMES Council, Mr. Hans Guttman, Executive Director of ADPC and Mr. Aslam Perwaiz, Deputy Executive Director of ADPC discussing the project.

Asian Disaster Preparedness Centre (ADPC) and the Regional Integrated Multi-Hazard Early Warning System for Africa and Asia (RIMES) join hands to implement a multi-year project on Climate Adaptation and Resilience for South Asia (CARE) which is currently being appraised by the World Bank.

The social and economic wellbeing of people living in the South Asia region is vulnerable to the impacts of climate-related hazards. The vagaries of the weather have already caused astronomical human and economic losses in this region. A recent World Bank study concluded that without adopting ambitious policies, areas home to 800 million or 44 percent of people in the region today can become moderate or severe climate hotspots by 2050.

The World Bank has launched an initiative to equip governments with the data and evidence they need for risk-informed decision making. The program will also facilitate regional collaboration to help develop standards to inform national climate resilience actions, strategies, and investments.

ADPC and RIMES will be the implementing partners of CARE. They discussed operational and technical coordination mechanisms to be put in place for the project implementation.

ADPC and RIMES agreed to build on each other’s comparative technical advantages and inputs for maximizing the implementation and impact of the CARE project which is expected to be launched in June 2020

Mr. A.R. Subbiah, Director, RIMES Council (left) discussing the project with ADPC

The proposed project aims to create an enabling environment for climate-resilient policies and investments across South Asia. All SAR countries will benefit from access to climate data and analytics, decision-support systems, guidelines and standards, and capacities for their application. However, Bangladesh, Nepal, and Pakistan will receive direct support on policy reforms, and institutional capacity building to apply the data and knowledge for climate mainstreaming.

ADPC is an intergovernmental organization, which aims to build the resilience of people and institutions to disasters and climate change. Based out of Bangkok, ADPC was established in 1986 and works in Asia and the Pacific. ADPC is governed by its nine founding member countries: Bangladesh, Cambodia, China, India, Nepal, Pakistan, the Philippines, Sri Lanka, and Thailand. It supports countries in building the capacity of their systems and institutions to ensure countries increase their resilience to numerous hazards, such as floods, landslides, earthquakes, cyclones, droughts, etc.

RIMES is an intergovernmental institution based in Thailand, comprising of 21 Member States from Africa and Asia and supported by 27 collaborating countries. RIMES caters to differential needs and demands of its Member States by enhancing capacities for end-to-end multi-hazard early warning

From left to right: Ms. Dusadee Moya, HRAF Manager of RIMES Council, Ms. Lolita Bildan, Chief of Program Unit of RIMES Council, Mr. Aslam Perwaiz, Deputy Executive Director of ADPC, Mr. Hans Guttman, Executive Director of ADPC, A.R. Subbiah, Director of RIMES Council and Mr. Irfan Maqbool, Director of Risk Governance of ADPC