Incorporating exposure and vulnerability data to improve disaster risk knowledge and provide impact-based early warnings for flood and drought

Existing hazard-based Early Warning Systems (EWS) do not always incorporate exposure and vulnerability data or provide impact-based information. In Kenya and Ethiopia, the EarlyWarning4IGAD project is piloting an approach for impact-based early warning for flood, focusing on the impacts for people and drought, concentrating on the impacts on crops and subsistence farmers. UNDRR commissioned UN University (UNU) and partners to develop risk models for the flood and drought impact-based forecasting (IBF) pilots in Kenya and Ethiopia.

The project is being implemented using the East Africa Hazards Watch. Enhanced data-sharing and risk analysis enabled by the platform will enable emergency responders to identify vulnerable populations, support early flood evacuation, improve drought impact monitoring for agricultural decision-making, and strengthen coordination among governments and stakeholders to safeguard lives, food security, and infrastructure.

Results will be validated by national Disaster Risk Management (DRM) communities of the IGAD member states, national hydro-meteorological services, the humanitarian sector, agriculture sector, policy-makers research and academia.

Constraints on data at the national and regional level can be addressed by utilising global datasets to cover gaps in national datasets, with validation at sub-county level as far as practicable. Collaboration among partners can help advance their respective capacity for finding data sources and following procedures such as data cleaning and quality control.