Netherlands for the World Bank

Your guide to the World Bank Group

Netherlands for the World Bank

As climate and disaster threats rise, let’s double down on resilient infrastructure

From tsunamis in Asia and earthquakes in Latin America, to hurricanes in the Caribbeanvietnam_blog and cyclones in Africa, disasters caused by natural hazards claimed some 1.3 million lives between 1998 and 2017, and wreaked untold havoc on livelihoods and infrastructure worldwide.

We see no sign of the risk posed by natural hazards decreasing, particularly having witnessed the devastating impact of Cyclone Idai on families and communities in Africa earlier this year. What’s worse, climate change is making storms, floods, droughts, and heatwaves even more frequent, damaging, and deadly.

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The Roadmap for Safer Schools—a conversation on making school infrastructure more resilient to natural disasters

gpss_roadmap_coverImagine that you are an advisor to your country’s Minister of Education. A recent earthquake damaged hundreds of schools in several cities. The minister has called for a meeting with you and asked: What are the main factors that contribute to the vulnerability of our school infrastructure? What can be done to prevent similar damages in the future?

So… What would you advise? In search of answers, we spoke with the leaders of the World Bank’s Global Program for Safer Schools (GPSS), who have recently launched an innovative tool, the Roadmap for Safer Schools. This roadmap is a guide to design and implement systematic actions to improve the safety and resilience of school infrastructure at risk from natural hazards. 

What makes schools unsafe?

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