Pacific Catastrophe Risk Assessment and Financing Initiative: A joint Initiative between World Bank, Asian Development Bank and South Pacific Applied Geoscience Commission (SOPAC) - Co-funded by The Government of Japan and the Global Facility for Disaster Reduction and Recovery (GFDRR). The Pacific Catastrophe Risk Assessment and Financing Initiative provides the Pacific Island Countries (PICs) with disaster risk assessment tools for enhanced disaster risk reduction and financial solutions for the reduction of their financial vulnerability to natural disasters. It is part of the broader agenda on disaster risk management and climate change adaptation in the Pacific region. It comprises two broad areas of work:  Pacific Disaster Risk Assessment - The Pacific Disaster Risk Assessment provides the PICs with disaster risk assessment tools to help them better understand and assess their exposure to natural disasters. This component builds on close collaborations between Work Bank, Asian Development Bank and SOPAC, with technical inputs from New Zealand geoscience research and consultancy institute (GNS), Geoscience Australia, Air Worldwide, Secretariat of the Pacific Community (SPC) and Pacific Disaster Center (PDC).
Pacific Disaster Risk Financing Solutions - Pacific Disaster Risk Financing Solutions initiative identifies a whole range of financial options for the PICs to improve the capacity of PICs to access incremental financial resources in case of natural disasters while maintaining their fiscal balance. It responds to a request made by the PICs at the 2007 World Bank/IMF Annual Meeting (read full progress brief).Â
|  | Brochures | | Â | Country Risk Profiles | | Â |
The country-specific catastrophe risk models are under development. First-generation models have been developed for selected islands (Cook Islands, Fiji, Papua New Guinea, Samoa, Solomon Islands, Tonga, Tuvalu, and Vanuatu) and draft country catastrophe risk profiles have been produced during the first phase of the initiative. Second-generation models are under development for each of the fifteen PICs. The models will simulate the economic and fiscal impacts of natural disasters in the PICs. They will provide loss maps and other risk metrics that will allow the governments and their partners to better assess their economic and fiscal exposure to natural disasters and help them prioritize risk mitigation programs. These models can complement climate impact models. They can also help in the design and pricing of disaster risk transfer instruments. | | | | | Â | |
 |         |  |  | AUSAID Workshop | Canberra, Australia | March 4, 2009 | |
| | | | | Â | | Â | | | | Â | | | Â | | | Â |
|
RSS