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Philippines

Philippines: Typhoon Early Action Protocol Summary (November 2019)

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SUMMARY OF THE EARLY ACTION PROTOCOL

This Typhoon Early Action Protocol (EAP) has been designed and can be implemented by the PRC chapters in 19 targeted provinces, in four different parts of the country, and is meant to facilitate anticipatory actions of the PRC when certain tropical cyclone forecasts show a high likelihood of a severe impact in the country.

This EAP provides step-by-step instructions for the selected actions to be implemented in a three days lead time. The typhoon Early Actions are to be triggered if the forecasted impact of the winds on housing, 72 hours before landfall, is more than 10 per cent of houses to be totally damaged in more than three municipalities. The impact forecasts are prepared with a statistical model developed by the 510 initiative of the Netherlands Red Cross (see sample provided for typhoon Ompong in September 2018), which allows the PRC to validate (or not) the trigger.
Once the trigger is confirmed, any further change of track / magnitude of the tropical cyclone will not lead to the cancellation of activities, and only livestock evacuation can still be adjusted

Three Early Actions are considered for minimizing the impact of typhoons on livelihoods and housing: (i) early harvesting of matured crops, (ii) livestock and assets evacuation and (iii) installation of shelter strengthening kits (SSK). In addition, cash for work is considered systematically for mobilising work force to implement these three early actions before the typhoon landfall, and will specifically benefit to vulnerable farmers, or fisherfolk (see section 5.6), by providing them with temporary employment. It is estimated that at least 50 per cent of these workers will be able to use the cash ahead of the typhoon.