Integrating Science Into Humanitarian and Development Planning and Practice to Enhance Community Resilience

These guidelines are for humanitarian and development practitioners looking to effectively integrate relevant scientific understandings of risk within their humanitarian/development planning and practice, for the purpose of enhancing community resilience. Beginning with an introduction to what science is and how it might be used, followed by a breakdown of the key components for integrating science these guidelines encourage practitioners to think about the types of scientific information and expertise that they may need, how to access and use them, and how to ensure that they are applied in an ethical and accountable manner. Each section concludes with a checklist of key questions practitioners should consider throughout the process.

 

These guidelines are not exhaustive or prescriptive instead the aim is to enable practitioners to ask useful questions that will ultimately help them to apply science in their planning and operational decision-making. While the authors acknowledge that invaluable knowledge resides in communities at risk, the draft guidelines are about how to utilise scientific and technical expertise from external institutions.