Delivering early warning systems for the poorest: From flood-vulnerable to flood-resilient communities

This publication makes a case for Flood Early Warking Systems (FEWSs) in delivering actionable information to the most vulnerable to floods. Based on Practical Action's work in Nepal and Bangladesh, the author argues that FEWSs must be locally owned to sustain resilience gains.

They key learnings presented in this document are:

• Ensuring that all community members and government staff understand flood risk is critical for the system to function (risk knowledge).
• Risk warnings can affect the lives of thousands of people and therefore must be accurate (risk monitoring).
• The communication network must ensure that all vulnerable people receive the warning in time (communication and dissemination).
• Flood-vulnerably communities must be able to respond to the threat effectively and in time (ability to respond).