Coastal Community Resilience (CCR)

Coastal communities around the world, large and small, are becoming increasingly vulnerable to a wide range of coastal hazards including severe storm events, tsunamis, shoreline erosion, and coastal resource degradation. Most of the coastal population lives in rural areas and in small to medium cities, where basic services and disaster warning and response mechanisms are limited. Population density coupled with increasing frequency and duration of storms, sea level rise, and other coastal hazards cause the impacts of disasters to be more severe and recovery to be slower and less sustainable. Proactive measures can be taken to reduce vulnerability and provide the enabling conditions for communities to absorb and bounce back from disruptions in basic services and economic activity. Coastal community resilience (CCR) encompasses understanding coastal hazards, taking deliberate and coordinated actions to reduce vulnerability, and having the appropriate and practiced contingency plans to respond to disaster events.

US IOTWS Contribution

Partners in the US IOTWS Program developed the CCR framework through a series of workshops and discussions with practitioners and specialists from government agencies and non-governmental organizations throughout the Indian Ocean region. Through this participatory process, eight elements of resilience were identified as essential for CCR. These elements incorporate long-term planning, disaster planning and preparedness, governance, and risk knowledge. Enhancing resilience in all of these elements is considered essential to reduce risk from coastal hazards, accelerate recovery from disaster events, and adapt to changing conditions in manner that is consistent with community goals. The US IOTWS Program then developed a CCR guidebook for the region—drawing from two major fields, integrated coastal management and disaster management—titled How Resilient Is Your Coastal Community? A Guide for Evaluating Coastal Community Resilience to Tsunamis and Other Hazards.

The program also implemented a focused initiative to promote hazard readiness through the active collaboration of emergency management agencies, coastal managers, training institutions, and local communities. Seven national and regional workshops supported a local planning process involving multiple stakeholders to address development needs, chronic events, and the response required for large episodic events or hazards that cause significant damage to life, livelihoods, and ecology. Teams in Indonesia, Sri Lanka, and Thailand, composed of members of national and local government agencies and NGOs, used the CCR framework to assess community resilience.

Next Steps

Several organizations, including the Asian Disaster Preparedness Center, Sri Lanka’s Disaster Management Center, Indonesia’s Department of Marine Affairs and Fisheries, CARE, the Nature Conservancy, and other international organizations have incorporated the application of CCR tools into their ongoing activities. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) will collect feedback from organizations on the CCR guidebook as it is used in the field.

For Further Information

Catherine A. Courtney, US IOTWS Program Integrator (kitty.courtney@ttemi.com)

Russell Jackson, NOAA Coastal Services Center (russell.jackson@noaa.gov)