In the times we’re in, it pays to be prepared and resilient.
Disaster resilience is the ability of individuals, communities, organizations and states to adapt to and recover from hazards, shocks or stresses without compromising long-term prospects for development.
According to the United States Department of Health and Human Services, individual health and resilience is important for community resilience because healthy, socially connected, prepared people make for stronger communities that are better able to withstand, manage, and recover from disasters.
Moreover, community resilience is the sustained ability of a community to utilize available resources (energy, communication, transportation, food, etc.) to respond to, withstand, and recover from adverse situations (e.g. economic collapse to global catastrophic risks)
With this mind, the Philippines is no stranger to natural calamities. From the world’s strongest typhoons to our particularly fortunate (or unfortunate) situation in the Pacific Ring of Fire, the country is at the mercy of the elements.
But this does not mean that people in the Philippines only rely on faith to get through any devastating “Act of God.”
For this reason, companies, and even local government units with the backing of the national government, have institutionalized Disaster Preparedness in their system.
In fact, there is now a growing demand, and lobbying from our politicians for the government to push through with the proposed Department of Disaster Resilience or DDR.
But, as we are celebrating the initiatives from various sectors in their social good programs, some have even taken it by heart by implementing it in their Corporate Social Responsibility Programs.