| Examples of guidance and toolkits for Participatory Vulnerability and Capacity Assessments | ||
| Name | Description | References |
| Red Cross Vulnerability and Capacity Assessment | This is intended as a simple and practical guide for National Society staff and volunteers who wish to undertake a local-level VCA, as part of their community programming strategy the guide contains a number of examples of VCA in practice. Vulnerability and capacity assessment (VCA) was developed to enable National Societies to help communities understand the hazards that affect them and take appropriate measures to minimize their potential impact and prevent hazards turning into disasters. These measures are based on communities own skills, knowledge and initiatives. VCA helps people identify the risks that they face in their locality, their vulnerability to those risks and their capacity to cope with and recover should a serious event occur. | For more information go to: http://www.ifrc.org/Global/Publications/disasters/vca/how-todo-vca-en.pdf Example from Rwanda http://www.ifrc.org/Global/Case%20studies/Disasters/cs-vcarwanda.pdf |
| Action Aid Participatory Vulnerability Analysis | A step-by-step field guide for field staff (and the communities in which they work). This guide is developed to assist field workers and communities to analyse people’s vulnerability, draw action plans, mobilise resources and enact appropriate policies, laws and strategies to reduce their vulnerability to disaster. This guide is specifically developed consistent with the PVA approach to: establish links between emergencies and development; — recognise developments or events at national and international level and how these impact on communities’ vulnerability; use the output of local level analysis to inform national and international level action and policies. | For more information go to: http://www.actionaid.org.uk/doc_lib/108_1_participatory_vulnerability_analysis_guide.pdf Examples of the use of PVA in a number of situations is given here: http://www.actionaid.org.uk/_content/documents/pva_case_studies.pdf |
| Practical Action Participatory Climate Risk Vulnerability and Capacity Assessment (PCR-VCA) | This is a methodology developed by Practical Action that incorporates climate risk into commonly used Vulnerable and Capacity Assessment. Some of the tools have newly been developed and tested to assess the community’s perceptions of increased climate risk and its impact on their lives and livelihoods. PCR-VCA provides a set of tools to operationalise the Adaptive Livelihood Framework (AFL) which suggests that increased adaptive capacity cannot be achieved through a single, narrow interventions and a more holistic approach is needed to accurately identify the challenges and barriers. For example a strong asset base and a supportive enabling environment are necessary preconditions for building the adaptive capacity of communities. PCR-VCA set of tools are broadly categorised under three different themes: assessing the community’s overall risk context; assessing livelihood assets base and assessing the enabling environment. | http://practicalaction.org/docs/ south_asia/participatory-climaterisk- vulnerability.pdf |
| Christian Aid's Good Practice Guide to Participatory Vulnerability and Capacity assessment | This guidance explore why and how to carry out a PVCA including the main challenges that Christian Aid staff and partners have faced while carrying out the exercise, offering recommendations on how to overcome them. Part one of these guidelines explains what PVCA is, the benefits of this approach and when it can be applied. Part two describes a step-by-step approach to conducting the assessment and the main challenges that are likely to occur at each step. PVCA was developed as a disaster risk reduction tool to be used for designing any livelihoods or poverty reduction projects. With increasing understanding of the short, medium and long-term impacts of climate change, the importance of applying PVCA to a wider set of livelihood risks is growing. It also helps reveal the links between the different kind of risks a community faces and how they interact. | For more information go to: http://community.eldis.org/?233 @@.59e79141!enclosure=.59e 79148&ad=1 Example of undertaking a PCVA from Bangladesh http://buildingcommunityresilience.org/ index.php?title=Towards_Building_A_ Disaster_Resilient_Community:_ an_example_of_PVCA_from_Bangladesh |
| Changing climate, changing disasters: pathways to integration | This is a practical guide for development professionals, and disaster risk managers in particular, to understand what changing disaster risk and uncertainty could mean for their programme and policy planning and to encourage. ‘Climate Smart Disaster Risk Management’. The authors say it is not a new tool; but that it will help in improving existing ways of working. It has been developed in collaboration with disaster risk management practitioners. It thus benefits from the lessons learnt by people actively engaged in becoming climate smart and asking questions such as: What are we doing well? Where are the gaps? What do we need to do differently? What will be our next steps? The guide is designed to address such questions through following a step-bystep process. It is not offered as a quick fix emphasises that it requires a level of commitment to use. There is an emphasis on learning and reflection throughout | http://community.eldis.org/ .59d5ba58/SCR-changing- climatechanging-disasters-2012.pdf |
| Participatory Tool on Climate and Disaster Risks: integrating Climate Change and Disaster Risk Reduction into Community Level Development Projects | The tool aims to help community-level project developers, managers and coordinators to analyse existing or planned development projects with respect to climate change and disaster risks. The tool seeks to help users to understand how climate risks and other natural hazards affect local livelihoods in their project area and how the local population currently deals with these hazards. The tool can also help in evaluating how existing or planned projects affect local resources that are vulnerable to climate and disaster risks, considering gender-specific issues and adjust existing projects or design new activities designed to strengthen beneficiaries’ adaptive capacity. The tool aims to integrate climate change and disaster risks into all community-level development activities. It can also be used to devise advocacy strategies. NB The tool is largely based on CRiSTAL and on the Care CVCA (see above) and using the same open-source philosophy readers and users are encouraged to apply and adjust the Participatory Tool on Climate and Disaster Risks for their own purposes. | http://www.adaptationlearning.net/ guidance-tools/climateproofing-tool- strengtheninglocal-adaptation-and- mitigationcapacities-commun |
| Framework for Community- Based Climate Vulnerability and Capacity Assessment in Mountain Areas, ICIMOD | This Framework for Community-Based Climate Vulnerability and Capacity Assessments in Mountain Areas provides a methodology for assessing environmental and socioeconomic changes affecting the livelihoods of rural, natural resource dependent communities living in mountainous environments. It also gives guidance on how to gain a better understanding of the various forces which shape mountain communities’ vulnerabilities, and places a special focus on the capacities inherent to these communities for coping with and adapting to environmental and socioeconomic changes. The rationale of the framework is based on the assumption that in order to identify the key determinants for future adaptation, we need to have a much better understanding of current climate change impacts, of mountain communities’ perception of these changes, and of their traditional repertoire of response strategies. | The framework is intended primarily for development practitioners and institutions working on climate change vulnerability and adaptation in mountainous environments |
| Climate Change Adaptation: enabling living in poverty to adapt | A research report written by Catherine Petengell at Oxfam GB that draws on case studies from around the world as well as Oxfam’s experience working with rural communities. It sets out what is needed to enable people living in poverty to adapt to climate change, and a range of interventions that are available. Oxfam’s approach brings together experience in the areas of livelihoods, natural resource management, and Disaster Risk Reduction, with robust decision making in order to manage uncertainty and risk, and to build adaptive capacity from household to national and global levels. The report identifies the combined need for bottom-up and top down processes in order to create the enabling conditions needed for people living in poverty to adapt to climate change. | http://policypractice.oxfam.org.uk/ publications/climate-change- adaptationenabling-people-living- inpoverty-to-adapt-111978 |
Related decision tree of the Pathfinder:
| Decision tree: Capacity analysis |
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Access Toolbox detail pages to learn more on selected methods and tools.
| Vulnerability and capacity assessment (VCA) | |
| CRiSTAL | |
