Overview of WLE initiatives on floods and drought in South Asia By Giriraj Amarnath, Principal Researcher – Disaster Risk Management and Climate Resilience, International Water Management Institute (IWMI) Drought and flood risk reduction strategies From Research to Resilience WLE webinar series October 7, 2021

1. Overview of WLE initiatives on
floods and drought in South Asia
Giriraj Amarnath, Ph.D.
Principal Researcher – Disaster Risk Management
and Climate Resilience

2. Framing WLE’s Water Risks and Building Resilience Strategy
CAT insurance
Weather risk
management
Bundled solutions
Other emerging
products
Preparedness: early warning
systems,emergency planning
and response capacities
Mitigationandprevention:
Medium to long term
sectoral planning(e.g.,building
resilient infrastructure)
Historical hazarddata,
analysis andchanging
hazardtrends
Exposedassets and
vulnerability
Risk quantification
Governance,policy and institutionalarrangement
Capacity building and gender, youth and inclusiveness
Knowledge productsand advisory services
Risk
Identification
Risk
Reduction
Risk
Transfer

3. Partnership for transformation
…and many,
many more.

4. Identifying vulnerability hot spots for climate change
Some areas will be more affected than others.
IWMI design locally relevant adaptationmeasures
Food security and poverty
key issues
Drought
70% land
Floods
12% land
Cyclones
8% Land
Extreme heat
Widespread
Salinity
Coastal
ingression
Climate change
Very
vulnerable
Main Users: World Bank, ADB,CG Centres and academics

5. South Asia Drought Monitoring System (SADMS)
strengthens three drought pillars
Monitoring and early warning
Remote
sensing
drought
indices /
indicators
Understanding
drought risk
usinglong-
term SADMS
analytics
Feeds into the
development/d
elivery of
information
and DSS
Vulnerability and Impact assessment
Identify who
and whatisat
risk and
Why?
Monitoring
the impactof
resilient
development
Mitigation and Response
Planning
SADMS to identify
actionsto reducerisks
(shortandlong-term)
and contingency plans
Safety netand social
program,research and
extension
Guidingwarning, emergencyand relief efforts
SADMS
-
-

6. Drought Surveillance System for South Asia
Information and Action Knowledge
Agriculture Stressmonitoringusing satellite indices Consultationand awarenesson the digital tools
and actionable information
Decisions
Drought response strategiesintegration
informationandknowledge products for
decisionmaking process

7. Jan
Feb
Mar
Apr
May
June
July
Ago
Sept
Oct
Dec
Nov
Oct
Drought and food insecurity seasonality Monitoring, detection and triggering
Year1
Year0
Jan
Feb
Mar
Apr
May
June
July
Ago
Sept
Dec
Nov
Year1
Year0
End of winter
- spring rains
Crop failure, reduced productivity, reduction in
livestock health
Highfood
prices
Lean season – no coupling strategies
Drought Early
Warning
Drought
declaration
Early
response
triggering
Bi-weekly DEWCDrought
Outlook (focuson met&
Agri drought)
Drought Seasonality
Food Ins. Seasonality
Monthly DEWCDrought
Outlook (focuson Agri &
Socio- EconDrought)
Seasonality of drought and food insecurity vs monitoring and triggering
Source: World Bank

8. Flood Inundation Modelling in Sri Lanka (Basin scale)
Numerical model forsimulationoftwo-dimensional flood
inundation distributionwhich was developedbyICHARM.
Merit of the RRI model
Combinationof slope flowandchannel discharge: this
helps to apply to areas whichhave hills and floodplains.
Free of charge; this couldhelp decisionmakingin
developingcountries.
Simulated extentsof flood inundationby the models The RRI model
RRI model (Sayamaetal.,2012)
• Able to complement discrete-timeresults of satellite images
(and also in cloudy periods);
• Applicable to hazardprediction andvulnerability evaluation;
• Able to assist NRT simulationfor early alert framework,eveninpoorly
gauged basins.
Amarnath etal.2015
Satellite Observation Simulated with the RRI model
82°0'0"E
82°0'0"E
80°0'0"E
80°0'0"E
8°0'0"E
8°0'0"E
10°0'0"N
8°0'0"N
6°0'0"N
±
0 40 80 120 160
20
Kilometers
8°0’0”N
6°0’0”N
80°0’0”E
Domain
of calculation
Badulla
Batticaloa

9. Insuring the uninsured
Pilot trials
InIndia andBangladesh
since 2017
+10,000
Households
$170,000 USD
Total payout
125k HH
Scaling

10. De-risk through bundled solutions
Build resilience to supply chains and improve productivity
• IWMI and its partnersoffers
• Weather based weather insurancewith
• Seed inputs
• Weather forecastand
• Agricultureadvisory services provided to insured
farmers
• Grain procurement
• Credit link (sooner)
Source: IWMI
• Smallholder farmers are among the most vulnerable to climate shocks
• Lack of education and technical skills, poverty, agriculturalinvestments,
limited assets and financial capitalare major reasons for low
investmentsin enhancing adaptive capacity.
• Technology could be the key to improving smallholder resilience to
disastersand their opportunities for recovery.

11. BICSA in Sri Lanka
Betterseeds, Weather Index Insuranceand agroclimateadvisories
Sunday Times (18 April 2021)
+15,000
Households
Scaling in 5 Districts
PPP Model
• WII developed uses satellite data
• Developing aggregatormodel with value-chain partners
https://bit.ly/3ylmbpQ

12. Tunisia
IWMI’s ongoing drought resilience projects
Ethiopia
Afghanistan
Morocco
Madagascar
India
Nepal
South Asia + Afghanistan (DEWS)
Southern Africa
MENA
Senegal and Ethiopia
South Africa
Zambia
Myanmar
Turkey
Iraq
Tanzania
Botswana
Zimbabwe
Mozambique

13. Southern Africa Drought Resilience Initiatives (SADRI)
https://geowb.maps.arcgis.com/apps/MapJournal/index.html?appid=cb0fc8aa450f4b35a018f7e0115867be
WASA
Products
Utilization

14. WLE Outcomes and
Key messages
• Preparedness through monitoringand earlywarningis an
important step towardsproactivelyenhance disaster
resilience among communities (SADMS,WASA)
• Promoted institutional coordinationand disaster risk
governance are critical in respondingto climate shocks
• WLE knowledgeproducts and information services helped
in achievingresilient society(AF-DEWS)
• Build capacity among stakeholdersand promote innovation
for empoweringcommunities (e.g. SAARC, UNOOSA)
• Integrated adaptation focus in achievingsustainable
development and Sendai frameworkfor Disaster Risk
Reduction

15. Thank you
Giriraj Amarnath
Email:a.giriraj@cgiar.org