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A guide to disaster risk reduction and climate change adaptation

Summary

Toward Resilience: A Guide to Disaster Risk Reduction and Climate Change Adaptation (Emergency Capacity Building Project, published 03/01/2013; 194 pages, English/French/Spanish) is an introductory practitioner resource for staff of development and humanitarian organisations working with people whose lives and rights are threatened by disasters and climate change [source: oxfam]. It covers principles of effective practice, guidelines for action across sectors, case studies and tools for an integrated, rights-based approach to disaster risk reduction (DRR) and climate change adaptation (CCA) [source: oxfam]. The guide is also notable as the publication that accompanied a 2008 Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation $12.3 million grant to a six-agency consortium — the first joint funding proposal of its kind.

Tactics used

  • advocacy
  • capacity-development
  • rights-based-approach

Background

The Emergency Capacity Building (ECB) Project was a 2005–2008 collaboration between CARE International, Catholic Relief Services, Mercy Corps, Oxfam, Save the Children and World Vision International aimed at improving the speed, quality and effectiveness of humanitarian response [source: oxfam]. The 2013 Toward Resilience guide extended that collaboration into the climate-adaptation space, packaging the consortium’s joint learning into a 194-page reference for frontline staff and policy advocates [source: oxfam]. Its explicit framing — that disaster risk reduction and climate adaptation must be integrated and rights-based — was a deliberate departure from the siloed, technical and infrastructure-heavy approaches then dominant in the sector.

What happened

The guide was developed by the Emergency Capacity Building (ECB) Project and published on 03/01/2013 [source: oxfam]. It is available in English, French, and Spanish and spans 194 pages [source: oxfam]. It includes essential introductory information, principles of effective practice, guidelines for action in a range of sectors and settings, case studies and links to useful tools and resources, for the application of an integrated, rights-based approach to disaster reduction and climate change adaptation [source: oxfam]. A related case study describes how in 2008, following a first phase of the ECB Project, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation accepted a $12.3 million proposal from CARE International, Catholic Relief Services, Mercy Corps, Oxfam, Save the Children, and World Vision International for a further five-year joint programme, stepping outside their traditional grant-making strategy [source: oxfam].

Key people & organizations

  • Emergency Capacity Building (ECB) Project [source: oxfam]
  • Oxfam [source: oxfam]
  • CARE International [source: oxfam]
  • Catholic Relief Services [source: oxfam]
  • Mercy Corps [source: oxfam]
  • Save the Children [source: oxfam]
  • World Vision International [source: oxfam]
  • Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation — funder of the 2008 phase [source: oxfam]
  • Practical Action Publishing — publisher [source: oxfam]
  • Marilise Turnbull — editor/contributor [source: oxfam]
  • Charlotte Sterrett — editor/contributor [source: oxfam]
  • Amy Hilleboe — editor/contributor [source: oxfam]

Outcome

Verdict: ongoing.

The guide is a 2013 practitioner reference; it does not adjudicate a single campaign outcome [source: oxfam]. The associated $12.3 million Gates-funded joint programme provided a vehicle for further collaboration between the six agencies on disaster risk reduction and climate adaptation, and the guide was the most visible publication output of that collaboration [source: oxfam].

Lessons

  • A practitioner guide is more durable than a single campaign: a 194-page, three-language reference continues to shape frontline practice years after its publication.
  • Joint funding proposals from non-competing NGOs can move foundations (here, Gates) outside their traditional grant-making strategies; the 2008 ECB proposal is a documented example.
  • Integrated framings (here, DRR + CCA + rights-based approach) challenge sector siloes and give frontline staff a shared vocabulary that survives organisational change.
  • Multilateral authorship under a joint imprint (ECB Project) gives a publication credibility that no single agency could confer alone.
  • Translating core resources into French and Spanish from the outset — not as an afterthought — multiplies their reach in disaster- and climate-affected countries.

Sources

Disclaimer: Included as a teaching example of campaign craft, not as endorsement.

Sources & verification

  • oxfam — grounding: primary — license: link-only
  • Held note: This is a practitioner guide, not a single named campaign event. Useful as a case study of how a multi-NGO collaboration produced a shared adaptation-and-resilience reference; not appropriate for promotion to established as a campaign event.
  • Rewritten: 2026-06-25 via worker_casestudies_v2.py; deepened 2026-07-10 against RAW/a-guide-to-disaster-risk-reduction-and-climate-change-adaptation.md.

Last verified: 2026-07-09