What we do
GFDRR fosters resilience to climate change by:
Providing technical and implementation assistance on projects that bring technical knowledge, analysis, or operational tools to bear on climate challenges
Offering just-in-time capacity-building and advice to help countries strengthen institutional capacity and manage climate- and weather-related disaster risk, through small grants for rapidly-deployed advice or training
Creating analytical products that focus on communicating crucial knowledge about climate resilience
Climate and environmental conditions are changing at an unprecedented pace. To plan development and manage risks, we must account for the risks produced by climate change. The likelihood and intensity of heat waves, heavy precipitations and floods, drought, or windstorms are affected by climate change, and historical data can no longer be used as reliable predictors of future risks. To build a resilient future, development plans, policies, and projects need to use innovative solutions to integrate climate and disaster risk management.
An integrated approach to enhance climate-resilient development
Resilience to Climate Change is one of GFDRR’s core operating principles. The program supports climate- and disaster-resilient development, aiming to improve identification and understanding of risk under future climate scenarios; avoid the creation of new risks and reduce existing risks; and support the design and implementation of investment policies that include climate-resilience measures.
Climate change poses complex problems for sustainable development, and requires integrated solutions. GFDRR focuses its climate resilience activities in four complementary priorities, aligned with the Paris Agreement and the World Bank’s Climate Change Action Plan 2016-2020.
Through technical assistance, GFDRR provides operational advice and supports policy reforms to integrate climate and disaster risk considerations into development policies, strategies, regulations, plans, and programs.
- The Resilience to Climate Change team provides technical assistance grants to projects that address climate challenges on the ground. It also offers just-in-time capacity-building and advice grants to client countries – small grants (up to $50,000) that help those countries address specific climate resilience and weather-related disaster risk management issues.
Tools, Methods, and Innovations
GFDRR’s position within the World Bank provides the ability to generate, synthesize, and disseminate knowledge, methodologies, and decision-making tools to ensure climate resilience is a consideration in large development activities. GFDRR combines expertise in disaster risk management and climate adaptation to provide innovative solutions for resilient development.
- The Resilience to Climate Change program works to support high-priority analytical work focusing on climate resilience.
- The Small Island States Resilience Initiative (SISRI) produces Best Practice Notes highlighting climate resilience within its global community.
Enhancing Access to Financial Resources
Grants from GFDRR complement other global climate funds to enhance access to financial resources. Technical assistance grants have helped prepare and co-finance operations with the Climate Investment Funds, the Global Environmental Facility, the GCF, and other funding facilities.
- GFDRR, in partnership with the International Development Associaton (IDA) and Climate Investment Funds (CIF), is currently helping build the institutional capacity of the Bangladesh Water Development Board (BWDB) to mitigate the impact of storm surges and salt water intrusion in coastal polders.
Targeting Action to Vulnerable Sectors
GFDRR supports actions with high potential for reducing vulnerabilities across all development sectors.
- Vulnerable sectors and geographic areas—including transport, water, agriculture, energy, urban settings, and coastal zones—can benefit from innovative solutions to disaster risk reduction.
- Risk-informed spatial planning and nature-based solutions are "no/low-regret" methods to improve resilience in high-risk areas. No matter how the climate may vary in the future, these approaches will produce positive effects for communities, helping build resilience and keep people safer in a changing world.