Droughts can have severe irreversible impacts on agriculture, water resources, and livestock, among other adversities. To mitigate the impact, planning anticipatory action, together with the stakeholders by developing early warning systems and providing financial and technical assistance to vulnerable communities and stakeholders, is key.
To this end, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) is organizing a five-day simulation exercise on “Drought Anticipatory Action (AA) from 10 to 14 April in Karachi and Tharparkar districts of Sindh.In this regard, a provincial-level workshop was organized in Karachi on Monday in collaboration with Provincial Disaster Management Authority, Pakistan Metrological Department, District Administration, Tharparkar, and other relevant public institutions and humanitarian organizations.
The objectives of the provincial workshop were to provide stakeholders with an opportunity to simulate drought anticipatory actions following trigger and threshold-based early warning mechanisms and gauge the effectiveness of anticipatory actions ahead of drought; examine the efficiency and accuracy of early warning alerts; and improve coordination and interoperability of different actors to respond before a disaster takes place.
Workshop provided a unique opportunity for all stakeholders to rehearse a simulated scenario in form of various groups in which every stakeholder performed its role per anticipatory actions protocol: from issuing an alert to organizing consultations and launching a response for the community and mitigating the impact of drought through planned interventions.
The simulation exercise is the first of its kind where national and provincial stakeholders have come together to articulate a plan of action for unforeseen drought conditions. The Deputy Director of Operations, PDMA, and Sindh appreciated FAO’s efforts in formulating an anticipatory strategy for droughts in the province and was of the view that big losses can be averted or mitigated just by planning ahead of disasters.
The simulation workshop was attended by national and provincial disaster management authorities, relevant line departments, non-governmental organizations, farmers, and other key stakeholders. The workshop will be followed by another workshop in Tharparkar on Tuesday and a two-day simulation exercise with the communities in identified villages.
The simulation exercise will prioritize the loss of crops & other on-farm productions due to seasonal droughts and livestock mortality due to reduced fodder availability & vaccine as the risks. During the simulation, 800 households will be targeted by supporting them through multi-purpose cash assistance and livestock feed with a special focus on women in targeted villages. This simulation exercise is part of FAO Pakistan’s regional project on increasing the capacities and scaling up the understanding of Anticipatory Action including through Social Protection Systems, which is funded by the European Commission Civil Protection and Humanitarian Aid Operations (ECHO). The Anticipatory Action Simulation Exercise (AA SIMEX) aims at integrating the AA approach into ongoing country-level hazard-specific contingency planning processes.
