Australia aids Philippine disaster plan

Australia has committed over A$20.7 million (about P800 million) to support the Philippine government’s disaster risk management and climate change adaptation program.

The development aid will cover, among others, what Canberra calls the “Brace” project.

Brace is short for “Building the Resilience and Awareness of Metro Manila Communities to Natural Disasters and Climate Change Impacts.”

In a report, the Australian Aid for International Development (AusAID) said the Brace program will provide a “package of practical measures to prepare and protect communities from natural disasters and climate change impacts.”

The package will be implemented mainly in Taguig City and can be scaled up to contribute to reducing the physical, social and economic vulnerabilities of poor households living in the rest of Metro Manila, the report also said.

The project components include building safer, disaster-resilient settlements and “building the capacities of communities in 28 barangays (in Taguig) to practice disaster risk reduction strategies,” it added.

AusAID will also go to the following projects:

• Multi-hazard mapping in 27 priority provinces nationwide, A$3 million.

• Strengthening the disaster response capacity of the Philippine National Red Cross, A$1.2 million.

• Enhancement of the rapid earthquake damage assessment system of the Philippine Institute of Volcanology and Seismology and the severe wind risk analysis program of the Philippine Atmospheric, Geophysical and Astronomical Services Administration, A$1.5 million.

Post-emergency disease surveillance system of the Department of Health and the World Health Organization, A$600,000.