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SCENARIO OVERVIEW AND PLANNING ASSUMPTIONS

This document serves as the Papua New Guinea Disaster Management Team’s (DMT) contingency plan for a sudden-onset type emergency. It is intended to be used as a preparedness tool for DMT clusters to more efficiently and effectively respond in support of the Government of Papua New Guinea to a sudden, calamitous event that seriously disrupts the functioning of a community or society and causes human, material, and economic or environmental losses that exceed the community’s or the Government’s ability to cope using its own resources. It may also be used in the immediate aftermath of such an event to kick-start humanitarian assistance while regular assessments are still being conducted and can quickly be adapted to a humanitarian response plan to mobilise resources.

It has been designed for a most-likely scenario in Papua New Guinea for a ‘mid-scale’ event where the Government is likely to seek assistance from most or all sectors using available, in-country resources, but the scale of the event is not likely to attract significant external attention. For planning purposes, it is estimated that 150,000 people would be affected, and 50,000 people would require some for of humanitarian assistance.

While the impact of the disaster would depend on the event (flood, earthquake etc.) and the exact location, of the 50,000 people requiring assistance it could be expected that:

• around 48% would be women or girls and 15% (7,500 people) would be pregnant or breastfeeding women.

• around 50% (around 4,717 households) would report damage or destroyed houses and approximately 36% (for rural areas or 14% for urban areas) would be expected to be sheltering in the open with no access to shelter, water or electricity.

• around 15% (2,236 people) would be school age children who have lost access to education.