The integrated disaster risk management fund: sharing lessons and achievements

Southeast Asia is home to an estimated 36 million people living below the international poverty line, about 5% of the global total. If efforts to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals in this region are to succeed, undertaking disaster risk-informed developments is not a choice, but a necessity. Natural hazards impact large areas throughout the region, leaving an average financial loss of approximately $5 billion a year—a figure that is growing as climate change, population, economic development, and unplanned urbanization increase. In the last 3 decades, disasters triggered by natural hazards resulted in affected population of more than 397 million. It is in this context that the Government of Canada and the Asian Development Bank (ADB) established the Integrated Disaster Risk Management (IDRM) Fund in February 2013. The Fund was created to advance proactive integrated disaster risk management measures on a regional basis within ADB’s developing member countries in Southeast Asia. During its operation, the IDRM Fund funded 19 technical assistance projects. This publication provides an overview of those projects in terms of six key funding priorities: 

1. enhanced risk identification and analysis; 
2. increased investment in disaster risk reduction; 
3. improved access to disaster risk finance solutions, including for the poor and poor women; 
4. scaling up of community-based and genderfocused approaches; 
5. increased regional cooperation of IDRM; and 
6. enhanced knowledge and tools for IDRM.