UNDP supporting response, resilient recovery to floods and Typhoon Damrey’s impacts
Ha Noi – The United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) is supporting the assessment and coordination of the current emergency flood and typhoon response, and early recovery efforts in Viet Nam, which amount to USD 78,000. The organization is now actively reaching out to partners to look at how best to support the affected populations to effectively cope and recover.
On 4 November 2017, Typhoon Damrey, (Storm No.12) made landfall in Viet Nam with winds of up to 135 km/hour. The storm has heavily impacted more than 10 provinces, and comes directly on the tail of previous a particularly active storm season, and has caused widespread damage and extensive flooding.
Damrey is the strongest storm to impact Viet Nam’s South Central coastal region in at least a decade. The most affected areas include South-Central region (Khánh Hòa, Phú Yên, Bình Ðịnh, and Quảng Ngãi) and Northern Central region (Thua Thien – Hue and Quang Nam), and lesser extent, the Central Highlands (Lâm Ðồng, Kon Tum, Ðắk Lắk, Dak Nong and Gia Lai). An estimated 4.3 million people are affected by the typhoon, including more than 350,000 poor and near poor.
On November 6, the Government of Viet Nam requested the UN to provide support to affected populations. The Central Committee for Natural Disaster Prevention and Control (CCNDPC) has also actively responded to the impacts and led coordination in terms of preparedness and response to the typhoon in some Central provinces in Viet Nam.
UNDP has ongoing partnerships with the Government’s Disaster Management Authority, and has a long tradition of positive partnerships with the Viet Nam Red Cross, Women’s Union and civil society organizations. These networks have provided relief and recovery support in previous disasters including the 2016 drought and previous large scale flooding and typhoon events.
Resilience building, enhancing institutional capacity to prevent and respond to climate induced disasters and climate proofing investments in the small scale rural infrastructure has been integral part of UNDP’s disaster risk reduction and climate change adaptation projects.