Lighting the lamp in my house, my village and enlightening them all, I am Prabhu Sada from India. I am the member of DRR committee in Akaha village of Bakhri block, Begusarai, Bihar.

We (Mushahar community) work very closely with the local self-governance (Panchayat Raj Institution-PRI). Consistent community participation at local self-governance meetings has enabled village work plan with befitting budget.

On approval of our plans, as DRR committee members, we ensure that they are implemented and made to be disaster resilient.

In other words we have married the DRR (Caritas’ Disaster Risk Reduction project) to Development, facilitating support from government schemes on housing (Indira Awas Yojna), health-water and sanitation (clean drinking water with raised hand pumps) and environment (solar lamp posts).

We believe that we have set a successful model to development through a joint approach between community, Civil Society Organizations and local self-governance (Government).

Caritas’ community managed disaster risk reduction project recognize the need for an integrated approach towards disaster risk reduction addressing underlying risk factor to strengthen resilience against critical precondition at community level for sustainable risk proof strategy development.

We may not necessarily bring more food packets, build expensive houses, generate huge money but we make these vulnerable communities feel that they are not ALONE.

In the backdrop of regular floods in some of these areas, affecting poor (dalits and other backwards communities) farmers, Caritas’ ever developing risk reduction plans on climate adaptability not only restore lost livelihood but more importantly, the lost hope. We enabled some of these farmers to go for soil adaptability test and change to more flood resilient crops.

In recent past Caritas Asia has demonstrated a model of how a multi stakeholder approach can yield result in terms do reducing disaster risk.

In Caritas’ side event organized at 6th Asian Ministerial Conference on Disaster Risk Reduction, we have experience sharing from all this stakeholders.

Our 36 member Caritas Asia delegation has participated in all parallel events and presented their view and Caritas Asia messages.

The 6th AMCDRR has been a venue for countries, organizations and individual practitioners to meet and discuss the way forward in reducing disaster risk in the region. It is also the final regional inter-governmental meeting in Asia before the completion of UNISDR’s Hyogo Framework for Action 2005-15, in January 2015 and the 3rd World Conference on Disaster Risk Reduction (WCDRR) in March 2015.

This AMCDRR is found to a unique opportunity for Asian DRR organizations and practitioners to shape the HFA2, the successor arrangement of the HFA.