Unite community strength for disaster prevention

Vietnam is a country heavily impacted by disasters and climate change. Every year, disasters have taken their terrible toll on people and properties. Vietnamese residents across the country were utterly concerned and strived to join hands to help fellow citizens reduce the losses from the disaster. Hence, Mr. Phan Dien, Former Member of the Politburo and Former Standing Member of the Secretariat of the Communist Party of Vietnam, requested permission from the State to establish the Central Vietnam Disaster Prevention Support Fund. Initially, the project operated within 16 coastal provinces of Central Vietnam, an area frequently ravaged by storms and floods, causing great damage to people and property. It was later renamed as the Community Disaster Prevention Fund and expanded its scope of activity from Central Vietnam to the whole country. 

With positive support from benefactors, domestic and foreign enterprises, the coordination of Party organizations, authorities and local volunteers, the Community Disaster Prevention Fund has connected people in needs, multiplied community strength, and implemented many projects and activities, helping people improve their capacity to actively prevent and overcome consequences, mitigate damage caused by disasters, and provide humanitarian aids and charitable activities.  The virgin paper manufacturing industry requires the vast exploitation of natural wood, which consumes significant energy and water and releases toxic chemicals. Evidently, it takes 5 cubic meters of wood (equivalent to 17 trees), thousands of liters of water to create 1 ton of water, also decreasing nature's CO2 absorption capacity. 

In the above context, promoting paper recycling models is becoming a necessary direction to reduce waste pressure and utilise secondary resources. Therefore, Miza's project is implemented as a solution contributing to closing the circular loop of the paper industry, from collection and classification to re-production. This approach helps reduce the amount of landfilled waste, limits natural wood exploitation, and creates more stable livelihoods for the scrap collection workforce—a labour group playing an increasingly clear role in the process of transitioning to a circular economy. Re.Uniqlo was initiated in 2021 to give another lifecycle for clothing products, through collecting used UNIQLO products from customers, then cleaning, sorting, and handing them to people in difficult circumstances, highland students, or communities affected by natural disasters. The project serves not only as a solution to minimise environmental impact but also as a path to serve, optimising the product lifecycle to turn products that seem to have lost their utility into warmth and hope for those truly in need. 

With disaster developments in Vietnam becoming increasingly extreme and unpredictable, the Fund has stood side-by-side and continuously accompanied the National Steering Committee for Natural Disaster Prevention and Control in building safe communities that proactively prevent and control disasters according to the "4-on-the-spot" principle, specifically supporting the establishment of 13 model response teams in communes and investing in equipment for more than 18 commune-level disaster prevention response teams. The Fund, together with the Standing Office, helped the National Steering Committee develop a set of standard documents for training this force and sponsored the printing costs. 

In recent times, the Community Disaster Prevention Fund has seriously implemented cooperation commitments, particularly in providing funding for the procurement of equipment to improve the capacity of commune-level disaster prevention response forces in all regions of the country, contributing to building safe communities in the face of natural disasters. 

The projects and works implemented by the Fund cover and span all three stages: before, during, and after a disaster. These include monitoring stations to track and supervise rainfall; multi-purpose schools, health stations, and community houses built in areas where storms and floods frequently occur, ensuring safety for residents in flood zones while meeting social security needs under normal conditions; or projects and programs to overcome clean and fresh water shortages caused by drought and saltwater intrusion, capital support for poor women, and support for village/commune-level disaster prevention response teams… 

For the past 15 years, the Community Disaster Prevention Fund has accompanied the country's cause of disaster prevention and control, and for the past 15 years, the Fund has accompanied the Meteorology and Hydrology Sector. Recently, the Community Disaster Prevention Fund and the General Department of Meteorology and Hydrology solidified their cooperation through data sharing, strengthening flood and disaster warning work, and coordinating communication work to raise community awareness about proactive disaster prevention. More than 700 automatic rain monitoring stations sponsored by the Fund have been integrated into the meteorological and hydrological database, creating a digital rain map that better meets forecasting needs and improves forecast quality, especially for flash floods and landslides in mountainous areas where the station network is still sparse, effectively serving the management and operation of central and local disaster prevention, especially during the storm and flood season.  

Objective

The Community Disaster Prevention Fund sets the goal of gathering, connecting, and bringing together State, private, and social entities to bond and share under a common approach in disaster prevention and control, taking prevention as the main focus to minimise damage caused by natural disasters, thereby promoting efforts to respond to climate change and proactive prevention. Specifically:

1. Fully transfer the hearts and sponsorship funds of benefactors directly to those in need of help in a complete, open, and transparent manner.

2. Choose to implement projects and activity programs that meet urgent needs and bring practical benefits to the people, which are also tasks within the Fund's capacity. Prioritise projects that serve and help children, women, and vulnerable groups during disasters, as well as multi-effect projects and multi-functional works that serve both socio-economic needs and disaster prevention. 

3. Pay special attention to connecting resources from the community and coordinating the Fund's activities with relevant social organisations so that project implementation achieves high efficiency, creates a large ripple effect, and brings many benefits to society.

Vision

After more than 15 years of operation, through hundreds of projects, the Fund has achieved respectable results, contributing significantly to the development and construction of community disaster prevention programs, thereby solving current challenges related to prevention, response, and recovery from disasters through new approaches, improving infrastructure, and offering policy mechanism recommendations to enhance the ability to adapt to extreme climate phenomena in the future. The achievements are the motivation to help the Fund continue its efforts to maintain activities and expand its scope to promptly support people across the country. Specifically:

1. The Fund has performed well in its role as a bridge with a large ripple effect between Donors and people in areas affected by natural disasters, true to its name “Community Disaster Prevention Fund”. 

2. The Fund always focuses on the core issue of helping people proactively prevent disasters and preserve lives and property before disasters strike.

3. The Fund has expanded its scope of activity throughout the country with the motto of “proactive prevention,” so the projects implemented by the Fund all aim to help the community improve its capacity for self-prevention and safe adaptation.

4. The Fund is a reliable address due to its transparency, ensuring that domestic and foreign organisations and individuals trust and entrust their support to projects mobilised and implemented by the Fund.

The projects the Fund has implemented over the past 15 years can be classified into 4 main groups:

Group 1: programs and projects supporting children and students

- Building community disaster prevention works: These are firmly and solidly built two-story architectural works in areas where storms, floods, and inundation frequently occur.

- Building school swimming pools in 36 provinces and cities: Introducing swimming into the main curriculum from the elementary level, to prevent drowning accidents that frequently occur with children and teenagers.

- School equipment support program: Helping to mobilise sponsorship to implement the program of donating teaching equipment and childcare items to 123 kindergartens, elementary schools, and middle schools nationwide, helping these facilities restore and improve learning and living conditions after disasters.

- “For a Green Future” scholarship program: Providing emergency support to students affected by disasters, helping them maintain their studies and have enough school supplies, books, and clothes to return to school.

Group 2: projects to improve proactive disaster prevention capacity

- Installing 843 automatic rain measuring stations and 16 community-based early flood warning towers in 48 provinces/cities nationwide.

- Building commune-level rescue and relief response teams and supporting the State in building grassroots-level disaster prevention response teams (village/commune) throughout the country.

- Pilot planting of 106 ha of protective mangrove forests to protect sea dikes in Thanh Hoa province.

Group 3: projects to support people in reducing life difficulties during and after disasters

- Projects to overcome clean and freshwater shortages caused by drought and saltwater intrusion.

- Revolving capital support for poor women to develop livelihoods and prevent disasters.

- “Building climate-resilient, compassionate houses in 2022” project in Tra Vinh province.

Group 4: emergency relief programs.

- Emergency support programs for households facing difficulties after disasters.

- Emergency support programs during the COVID-19 pandemic.

In addition, the Fund also regularly organizes communication activities to raise awareness about proactive disaster prevention and to honor sponsors, such as: Television art exchanges, workshops, and seminars to evaluate the model and effectiveness of projects.

Budget

In its activities, the Fund focuses on proactive prevention, finding every way to mitigate the impact caused by natural disasters. In addition to connecting with the core forces of the state, the Fund strives to mobilise contributions from the people, all forces, and social organisations to accompany and coordinate so that relief and disaster recovery activities take place most effectively. The subjects the Fund prioritises connecting and mobilising are sponsors and benefactors in order to receive solid companionship and financial support, ensuring all the Fund's activities.

Regarding the selection of programs and projects to implement, in order to bring the most benefits to the people, the Fund prioritises project selection according to the following criteria:

+Meeting the most urgent needs, helping the most difficult social groups and those most vulnerable to disasters, such as children, women, ethnic minorities, etc.

+ Multi-functional and multi-effect projects that can be used for many tasks, meeting many needs, having both disaster prevention effects and serving civil needs such as education, health, culture, etc.

+ Prioritising model-type projects with a ripple effect to bring about great efficiency and great significance.

+ Selecting projects within the Fund's capacity that are feasible and can facilitate the mobilisation of other social resources to participate, accompany, and contribute reciprocal capital.

+ Paying special attention to ensuring financial safety and managing all income and expenditures in accordance with the law, with absolute safety. Fully transferring the sponsorship of benefactors directly to the people is the moral obligation of the Fund.

In the early years of its establishment, the Fund's income mainly came from large state-owned enterprises, along with active contributions from localities as reciprocal capital for construction projects such as community disaster prevention houses, school swimming pools, domestic water works, afforestation, etc.

The total amount of sponsorship mobilised by the Fund from its establishment until the end of 2023 reached nearly 609.7 billion VND.

Many businesses, entrepreneurs, organizations, and individuals have enthusiastically supported the Fund's activities, both financial amount or physical provisions, helping the Fund facilitate the implementation of its programs and goals. In which:

- State-owned enterprise sector: 200.9 billion VND

- Private enterprise sector: 367.4 billion VND

- Foreign organisations, enterprises, and individuals: 32.7 billion VND

- Other organisations and individuals: 8.7 billion VND

The program has recorded significant results in community development and disaster prevention. Specifically, 122 community disaster prevention works have been deployed, along with 142 drowning prevention swimming pools and 25 clean water works constructed. In addition, the technical support system was strengthened through 843 automatic rain measuring stations. In terms of finance and livelihoods, the program provided 18 billion VND in loan capital, supporting 1,021 struggling women’s households. At the same time, 85 commune-level disaster prevention response teams were established, improving response capacity and minimising local risks. 

Through 15 years of operation, the Community Disaster Prevention Fund has increasingly expanded its scope, connecting more compassionate hearts who want to share difficulties and help fellow citizens during disasters. The Fund's vision is to become a highly reputable NGO and a social charity fund in Vietnam in disaster prevention, an active part linking and promoting community strength, joining hands with the State and everyone to respond to natural disasters and climate change for a safe and happy life for every individual and household.

In the coming time, the Fund's activities will continue to implement the following key contents:

- Continue to support localities in building community disaster prevention works such as schools, health stations, and community houses in areas where storms and floods often occur.

- Support the construction of drowning prevention swimming pools to help elementary students know how to swim, have skills to save people when drowning occurs, and become a disaster prevention response force in the future. 

- Support clean water projects, addressing water source difficulties during natural disasters, droughts, and saltwater intrusion.

- Support revolving capital for poor women, helping them have more conditions to develop livelihoods and accumulate resources to build and repair houses and disaster prevention works at home.

- Support building automatic rain measure stations and flood warning towers to help localities respond to rain and floods effectively, and promptly relocate to safe places during storms, floods, and landslides.

- Support local people participating in forest planting and protection projects, especially large timber forests that can prevent natural disasters. 

- Support the teaching equipment provisions and childcare supplies for kindergartens, elementary schools, and middle schools heavily damaged by disasters, helping schools quickly stabilise teaching and learning.

- Award scholarships to students facing difficulties in disaster areas, creating conditions to help them continue going to school.

- Provide emergency relief to people in the event of natural disasters or epidemics.

- Focus on finding ways to mobilise more stable and larger sponsorship sources so that the Fund's activities can be expanded and become increasingly effective. The Fund is ready to expand relations with foreign non-governmental organisations and foreign-invested enterprises in Vietnam to regularly share information, access funding sources, learn from experience, and coordinate actions according to the Fund's target orientations.