Building Resilience to Social Vulnerability

1. Building Resilience to Social Vulnerability A SIDS Perspective

2. Objectives of presentation • Build consensus on theoretical underpinnings of social vulnerability • Examine linkages between economic, social and environmental vulnerability • Review status of work on social vulnerability • Agree on actions that can help build resilience to social vulnerability.

3. Theoretical underpinnings • Vulnerability refers to proneness to damage from external forces; • Economic vulnerability refers to risks faced from exogenous shocks to systems of production, distribution and consumption; • Environmental Vulnerability refers to risk of damage to natural eco-systems

4. Social Vulnerability • Social vulnerability reflects “…the degree to which societies or socio-economic groups are affected by stresses and hazards, whether brought about by external forces or intrinsic factors – internal and external – that negatively impacts the social cohesion of a country” (UNDP 2000).

5. Theoretical Underpinnings cont’d • Definition useful because it: • Establishes the link between the economy and the society; • Stresses that hazards can be external/ internal; avoidable/unavoidable; • Calls for a determination of the factors which promote cohesion and/or disunity; • suggests that even those actions that seek to build resilience, can also have an opposite effect.

6. Features of Social Vulnerability in SIDS • High rates of unemployment/under-employment; • High dependency ratios; • High poverty rates (absolute, endemic and relative 5%-60%); • Marginalisation of women, children and the elderly; • Dilution of local culture and values and their replacement with foreign cultures and values • Increased levels of crime/drug addiction

7. Features of social vulnerability cont’d • Increased consumption rates due to growing populations • dispersed rural settlements with implications for cost of service provision • Small populations but high population densities in urban/peri-urban/ coastal/valley areas with implications for health and sanitation • Undeveloped social sectors • Susceptibility to brain – drain • Susceptibility to infectious diseases

8. Features of social vulnerability cont’d • Vulnerability to extreme natural and man-made disasters and energy shocks • High unit costs of health, administrative education, judicial services • High transportation costs (inter and intra island) • High rates of internal (rural to urban) and international migration • Low levels of educational achievement/high dropout rates and illiteracy.

9. Features of Social vulnerability cont’d • Insecure food situation/high food import bill with negative dietary/health implications • Poor access to land/ links to food insecurity • Aging populations with implications for viability of social security/ health service delivery systems and transmission of values • Thinness of the insurance market

10. Features of social vulnerability • Underdeveloped public and private sectors • Low institutional capacity due limited HR capacity; • Weak development planning capacity • Lack of integration between economic, social and environmental aspects of planning • Lack of integration between the national and regional aspects of planning • Lack of participation in the planning and decision-making process • Lack of effective decision-support systems

11. Imperatives for building resilience • Strengthening development policy analysis, formulation and implementation arrangements • Develop institutional and technical capacity to formulate and implement trade policy • Strengthening channels for continuous participation in policy and planning processes

12. Imperatives for Building Resilience • Establish IDP arrangements that: • Reflect a common set of guiding principles ; • Allow for incorporation of physical and/or social impacts of economic activities or for environmental protection measures; • Routinely incorporates environmental, social, physical and spatial consequences of planning

13. Imperatives for Building Resilience cont’d • Develop the capacity of key national and regional institutions; • Increase the supply, use and retention of trained human resources; • Institutionalize dynamic planning and decision-making frameworks based on participatory processes; • More participation by CSOs in dev. process

14. Building Resilience (cont’d) • Generate sustained and comprehensive labour market information to better guide interventions in the labour market; • Reform education systems to ensure better fit between trained HR and national/regional development goals • Enhance labour market flexibility to meet productivity/competitiveness targets

15. Building Resilience (cont’d) • Develop an approved social policy framework based on: - a clear understanding of how individuals or families react to risk; - levels of risk, incomes and prices or costs of risk management • Promote the advantages of a disciplined, organised and comprehensive approach to managing risk; • Increase allocation directed at improving social capital

16. Building Resilience • Develop national and sub-regional policy frameworks for poverty eradication using the sustainable livelihood approach; • Provide social safety nets for the poor; • Undertake macro-economic and social analyses of social development programmes; • Enhance human and physical infrastructure

17. Building Resilience cont’d • Promote conflict resolution at h/hold, and community and national level • Empower marginalised groups • Ensure the livelihoods and income security of older persons • Build leadership capacity at community level • Better management of the expectations of the population

18. Building Resilience cont’d • Facilitate the development of an internal entrepreneurial culture • Create an environment conducive to local and foreign investment • THANK YOU!!!