In her opening words Anke Reiffenstuel, Ambassador of Germany to the Philippines. Ambassador Reiffenstuel was previously Head of Division for Humanitarian Assistance and Regional Policy of the German Federal Foreign Office in Berlin and has been an advocate of Forecast-based Financing from the very beginning. Ambassador Reiffenstuel highlight, how the current pandemic shows that preparedness is imperative.
"There has never been a better time to make the case for anticicaptory action", she said. In this region that climate change and extreme events do not stop for a pandemic. Several typhoons have hit the Philippines in the past weeks, and typhoon season is not over. "We have to address the whole complexity of challenges at the same time. It is reassuring and encouraging to see that the pandemic has not stopped any of you from implementing early actions like for the floods in Bangladesh and that actions could be adapted to mitigate the risk of Covid-19 transmission", she addresses the participants.
And highlights the important collaboration of FAO, Red Cross Red Crescent, WFP and Start on anticipatory action, for example seen in January, when both FAO and RC activated and coordinated their early action plans for Dzud in Mongolia, which they are now also evaluating jointly. Or in the summer ahead of the severe floods in Bangladesh, when anticipatory action funding from the UN’s CERF to UNFPA, FAO and WFP and from IFRC’s FbA by the DREF to Bangladesh Red Crescent Society enabled these organisations to act early and help protect nearly 300 000 people from the worst impacts.