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Responding to climate change:
community capacity-building for
comprehensive disaster reduction
Zhang Xiaoning, Secretariat of the Office of the State Committee and
Yang Peiguo, Department for Science and Technology Standards, National Disaster Reduction Centre of China
C
ommunity is at the forefront of disaster prevention and
reduction, with a key role to play in risk prevention and
response to disasters. Therefore, enhancing the capac-
ity of communities to prevent and reduce disasters is a matter
of great importance. The Chinese Government attaches great
significance to the work of communities to prevent and reduce
disasters, and is permanently committed to the overall improve-
ment of the communities’ capacity for comprehensive disaster
prevention and reduction.
Global climate change has led to the frequent occurrence of natural
disasters caused by extreme weather and climate events. In addi-
tion, community disaster reduction work in China
now faces a more complex environment. Due to the
weak infrastructure in place for disaster prevention
and reduction, the need to enhance public awareness
on disaster reduction, and the wide gap in the resources
invested in community disaster reduction, community
capacity-building for disaster prevention and reduction
in China remains a challenging task.
In recent years, the Chinese Government has followed
the guidelines for disaster reduction identified in the
Hyogo Framework for Action, and has been carrying out
work with a close focus on improving the capacity of
community disaster reduction, achieving great results.
National development policies
Work on community disaster reduction has been
incorporated into national development policies.
In recent years, documents issued by the Chinese
Government have listed community disaster work as
an important element. These documents include the
following:
• Opinions of the State Council on strengthening and
improving community services
• Opinions of the State Council on comprehensively
strengthening emergency response
• Eleventh Five-Year National Plan for comprehensive
disaster reduction
• Opinions of the General Office of the State Council
on strengthening the competence of grass-roots
emergency response personnel.
The documents require governments at all levels and
various relevant departments to strengthen the commu-
nity contingency plan, the competence of personnel
and infrastructure, in order to improve disaster reduc-
tion work.
Community disaster reduction projects
A large number of community disaster reduction
projects have been implemented under the Chinese
government. Focusing on community capacity-build-
ing for disaster reduction, the Chinese Government has
2046
Earthquake drill in a school
Image: Makou community in Sichuan province