Period covered: January to December 2012

Overview

The DREF allocated a total amount of CHF 22,836,393 in 2012. Seventy-five per cent of the allocations, CHF 17,076,253, were made as grants to small-scale operations implemented by National Societies for which no emergency appeal was launched, known as DREF operations. CHF 5,760,140 was allocated as loans of start-up funding to emergency appeals.

WMO Annual Climate Statement Confirms 2012 as Among Top Ten Warmest Years

GENEVA, 2 May 2013 (WMO) The World Meteorological Organization’s Statement on the Status of the Global Climate says that 2012 joined the ten previous years as one of the warmest — at ninth place — on record despite the cooling influence of a La Niña episode early in the year.

HIGHLIGHTS:

• COLOMBIA: First rainy season affects at least 70,000 people.

• PERU: The rainy season affects more than 176,000 people.

• LAC: The coffee rust epidemic causes losses of more than 441,000 jobs in Central America.

Agriculture in Haiti: Highly Vulnerable, Mostly Uninsured

STORY HIGHLIGHTS

Thirty-two countries* will participate in a full-scale tsunami alert exercise in the Caribbean on 20 March 2013. The goal is to test the reaction capacity in countries of the Caribbean and adjacent regions, including the East Coast of Canada and the United States, the Gulf of Mexico and Bermuda. The exercise was organized under the auspices of UNESCO’s Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission (IOC).

OVERVIEW

Countries in Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) experience a multitude of natural hazards, including earthquakes, hurricanes, floods, tsunamis, landslides, volcanoes, forest fires, and drought. El Niño, a climate pattern that occurs on average once every three to seven years, periodically exacerbates the impacts of hydrometeorological events. Environmental degradation and poor land-use management also increase populations’ vulnerability to natural hazards.

Link: Disaster Risk Reduction – Latin America and the Caribbean Fact Sheet #1, Fiscal Year (FY) 2012

INTRODUCTION

This report, for the period 1 June – 30 November 2012, is the first semiannual report, covering the first six months in the 2012/2013 fiscal and policy year for CCRIF. It is designed to provide an update on progress during this period towards achievement of CCRIF’s Strategic Objectives (see Figure 1) as defined in the CCRIF Strategic Plan 2012/2013 – 2014/2015. In providing this progress update, this report also illustrates how the Facility upholds its customer values.

The report presents:

Thousands of people are still dealing with the hurricane's effects, especially in Cuba where a lack of funding is hampering the response.