The World Bank (WB) and the Asian Development Bank (ADB) have accepted a call by the Government of Pakistan to lead the Damage and Needs Assessment (DNA) of the recent floods that have devastated the country.
"The World Bank has completed numerous Damage and Needs Assessments world-wide in collaboration with other key financing and donor institutions such as ADB and we will be bringing that experience to bear on this DNA, which is going to be a challenge considering the enormity of the disaster", said Rachid Benmessaoud, World Bank Country Director for Pakistan.
"The ADB and WB will collaborate with One UN and other key donors through participation and sharing of information." DNAs are generally conducted in the shortest possible time immediately after a natural disaster to provide the government and international community with a credible assessment of the extent of the damage and an estimate of the cost to reconstruct and rehabilitate the damaged infrastructure and services.
Response to natural calamities has four phases: rescue, immediate relief, early recovery, and reconstruction. Rescue and immediate relief efforts focus on rescue, temporary shelter, food, and primary health care. During early recovery, focus shifts to restoring functions such as communications and service delivery interrupted by the disaster until reconstruction is completed. The reconstruction phase focuses on replacement of infrastructure damaged or destroyed by the disaster.
"This is the fourth DNA that ADB and WB are jointly conducting in Pakistan in close collaboration with the Economic Affairs Division, but this one is unique given the scale of devastation and the geographical spread of the calamity'', said Rune Stroem, ADB Country Director for Pakistan. ''As Pakistan's development partners, we are committed to the need of completing this task as quickly as possible; At the same time, we are also aware of the need to do a world- class DNA. If there is no fresh wave of flooding; and damage data collection and compilation can continue without interruption, the assessment is expected to be completed by mid-October'.
Using the universally recognised UN ECLAC methodology, all DNA data will be closely scrutinised using various analytical and statistical tools, including rationality and plausibility checks and damage analysis across sectors by comparing relative percentage damage in various sectors at the provincial and district levels. Field visits will also be made to meet with various stakeholders, particularly the affected population, to assess the accuracy of the damage data.
The DNA focuses on estimating three types of costs: (i) "direct damage" is estimation of the monetary value of completely or partially destroyed assets, such as social, physical and economic infrastructure immediately following a disaster; (ii) "indirect losses" estimate income losses, and comprise both the change of flow of goods and services and other economic flows such as increased expenses, curtailed production and diminished revenue, etc; and (iii) "reconstruction costs" measure the cost of rebuilding lost assets and restoring lost services. It is generally assessed at the replacement cost with a premium added for building back better.-PR
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