Hazard Note 11: The planners and the people – bridging the gap in disaster risk reduction

Community risk assessment is essential when preparing for, responding to and recovering from the impact of natural hazards.

Historically, community risk assessment is either led by agencies (top-down) or by communities (bottom-up). Such a one-sided approach creates an incomplete picture of community risk.

The project team wanted to better understand the barriers to and opportunities for more coordinated community risk assessment practices. A guideline was developed that includes integration principles for community risk assessment, complemented with a range of alternative definitions and measurements of risk to be tailored to local needs.