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Preparedness

The knowledge and capacities developed by governments, response and recovery organizations, communities and individuals to effectively anticipate, respond to and recover from the impacts of likely, imminent or current disasters.

Preparedness action is carried out within the context of disaster risk management and aims to build the capacities needed to efficiently manage all types of emergencies.

This theme covers aspects related to preparedness, contingency planning, disaster response plans, prevention, anticipatory action.

What’s the difference between disaster risk reduction (DRR) and disaster risk management (DRM)?

Latest Preparedness additions in the Knowledge Base

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Storm surge responses in Macau: Early warnings and soft adaptation thumbnail
Documents and publications
Storm surge responses in Macau: Early warnings and soft adaptation

In this study, the authors investigated three major typhoons in Macau—Typhoons Hato (2017), Mangkhut (2018), and Ragasa (2025)—to examine changes in residents' evacuation behavior and government responses.

International Journal of Disaster Risk Reduction (Elsevier)
Airplane view Chari river Chad
Update
When the waters rise: how the city of N’Djamena, Chad, prepared for floods and averted disaster

PILIER launched a $13 million flood preparedness and response plan in early 2024 to protect N’Djamena during a high-risk rainy season.

World Bank, the
Anticipatory action in 2025: a global overview thumbnail
Documents and publications
Anticipatory action in 2025: a global overview

The report documents the continued expansion of anticipatory action globally in 2025, with record activations, growing institutional embedding, and a first-ever analysis of donor funding flows, while flagging persistent gaps in financing and coordination.

Anticipation Hub
Families are preparing fuel and energy to prepare for incoming disaster
Update
New report from the Anticipation Hub shows that anticipatory action reached 9.6 million people in 2025

The Anticipation Hub’s fourth annual overview of anticipatory action shows that this approach continued to expand in 2025, reaching 9.6 million people ahead of forecast hazards during the year.

Anticipation Hub
Burial team during the Ebola epidemic in Sierra Leone, 2015
Update
Why Africa – and the world – remain dangerously unprepared for the next pandemic

As the news spread about the outbreak of Ebola in mid-May 2026, the World Health Organization (WHO) released a report about pandemics. The title was: A World on the Edge: Priorities for a Pandemic-Resilient Future.

Conversation Media Group, the
Update
Research shows that prescribed fire, other fuels treatments net major savings

It’s well-established that prescribed fire and other fuel-reduction treatments can create significant ecological benefits and reduce the risk of catastrophic wildfire.

NPR
Update
Spain to launch largest-ever forest fire campaign after record losses

Spain is one of the southern European countries on the front line of climate change as higher average temperatures stoke heatwaves, droughts and forest fires.

The Local Spain
A thermometer showing high temperatures. A city is blurred in the background.
Update
How London, Paris and New York coped in the heatwaves of the past

Paris, London and New York are more often associated with culture, finance and history than with dangerous heat. Yet each summer all three are increasingly exposed to extreme temperatures they were never designed to withstand.

Conversation Media Group, the
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