The Building Climate Resiliency through Urban Plans and Designs (BCRUPD) project conducted a series of technical consultations and review with the Department of Human Settlements and Urban Development (DHSUD) to update and enhance the Climate and Disaster Risk Assessment (CDRA) analytics tool, used by local governments for risk-informed planning that addresses climate change impacts. While local governments are already using the CDRA, there are gaps and weaknesses in the existing CDRA. For instance, the tool does not take into consideration future risks and pandemic indicators. An enhanced CDRA can better assist the department in guiding local governments in human settlements planning, urban management, and green economic recovery. Officers and planners from three DHSUD bureaus participated the three-day virtual consultation on February 8, 9, and 11, 2021.

A survey was conducted to gather participants’ inputs on the tool’s 3 assessment areas (Methodology, Indicators, Analytics) before a thorough discussion of each area. Based on the analysis, the participants agreed that there is a need to harmonize the CDRA and other agencies’ existing assessment tools, including those of the Department of Agriculture and PHIVOLCS, for data consistency and tool standardization. Participants likewise suggested the consideration of future risks and the use of specific indicators for municipalities with Community Based Monitoring Systems (CBMS) and for those without CBMS to ensure the tool’s inclusivity and applicability. There was a consensus to use land-use as a major assessment area of the CDRA. Health/pandemic indicators and Philippine SDG indicators were also suggested. The discussion on analytics further emphasized that the CDRA tool is valuable when results translate to decision-making.

BCRUPD planned to automate the analysis and visualization of the tool in succeeding months, including support for DHSUD trainings to adopt the improvements.