Disaster Management in Nepal | Volunteers Initiative Nepal

Fact-Sheet

What has ViN achieved in Disaster Risk Reduction Program by now?

7,463

Rapid response

3,940

Disaster Preparedness

36,808

T. Beneficiaries

6,100

Rehabilitation

19,305

Reconstruction and Sustainability

Disaster and Risk Reduction Research

Why Disaster Risk Reduction Program (DDR)?

What is Disaster Risk Reduction?

Another program at VIN is the Disaster Risk Reduction program. Nepal is exceedingly prone to floods and landslides, particularly due to a dissected topography, rugged and fragile geophysical structure, very high peaks, with a high angle of slopes, complex geology, variable climatic conditions, and active tectonic processes. This challenging environment underscores the vital need for robust Disaster Management in Nepal. Large sections of the country are likely to suffer from episodic drought. Climate change worsens the conditions as the climate gets more and more extreme day by day, inviting disasters. Hence, every year the country has to bear the brunt of the most common natural disaster, claiming many human lives, huge economic losses, and earthquakes.

Historic Earthquake

A devastating earthquake hit Nepal in April 2015. The death count scaled to over 8,500 and more than 22,300 people were left injured. Out of 75 districts, 31 were affected, 14 of which were deeply impacted. The earthquakes destroyed 498,852 houses and 2,656 government buildings. An additional 256,697 private houses and 3,622 government buildings were partially damaged.

Death data for the period 1971-2007 documented more than 27,000 deaths, which designates an average loss of more than two lives due to natural calamities per day. In addition to the high death rates, more than 50,000 people were reported as injured, about 3,000 missing, and about 5 million people were affected during the same period. More people in Nepal are killed by calamities compared to any other country in South Asia.

Human-related problems such as violence, injury, fire, poisoning, epidemic disease, and more keep following disasters. The unplanned settlement, increasing population, weak economic conditions, low literacy rate, lack of coordination among agencies related to disaster management, resource constraint, the lack of technical manpower, the lack of public awareness, very remote, rural, and difficult geophysical situation of the country, coupled with an absence of modern technology are major obstacles to cope with these natural disasters in Nepal.

The most common and frequent natural disasters are:

Landslides:

Among the natural hazards that occur regularly in Nepal, floods and landslides are by far the most serious ones. They claim many human lives every year and cause other damages such as destruction and blockages of highways, and losses of livestock, crops, and agricultural land.

Earthquakes:

Geologically, Nepal is considered to lie in a seismic zone that experiences frequent earthquakes. As a result, earthquakes of various magnitudes occur almost every year and have caused heavy losses of lives and infrastructures on several occasions.

Windstorms, hailstorms, thunderbolts:

Raw exposure to the elements often affects many areas of the country regularly. These events, particularly the hailstorms, cause considerable damage to the crops in the fields.

Forest Fire:

Every year forest fires occur in many places of the country and cause heavy losses of property as well as a decrease in many species of wildlife and vegetation.

Glacial lake outburst flood events:

Apart from landslides and river erosion, the high mountains or Himalayas of Nepal, covering about 15 percent of the country, are quite susceptible to land degradation caused by glacial lake outburst floods (GLOF).

What’s the goal of Disaster Risk Reduction Program?

Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR) is a foundational pillar of the work carried out by Volunteers Initiative Nepal (VIN), recognizing the extreme vulnerability of the Nepali nation to a host of natural calamities. Geographically, Nepal’s unique, highly dissected topography, coupled with its rugged, fragile geophysical structure, and the presence of very high peaks with steep slopes, makes it exceedingly prone to both floods and landslides, particularly during the annual monsoon season. These geological factors, combined with active tectonic processes—given that Nepal sits within a major seismic zone—ensure that large-scale events like earthquakes are a constant and devastating threat, as tragically demonstrated by the 2015 Gorkha earthquake. Beyond geological hazards, variable climatic conditions contribute to episodic droughts in the Tarai region and increasingly extreme weather patterns across the country. Climate change is rapidly accelerating these vulnerabilities, inviting more intense and frequent natural disasters, forcing Nepal every year to bear the brunt of loss of human lives and staggering economic losses.

The necessity for a structured and holistic approach to disaster risk reduction has never been more pressing. At VIN, our commitment goes beyond mere post-disaster response; we focus intensively on the proactive measures needed to build resilience within highly susceptible communities. Disaster Risk Reduction involves a systematic process of analyzing and managing the causal factors of disasters, thereby reducing exposure to hazards, lessening the vulnerability of people and property, and improving preparedness. We integrate this philosophy into all our community programs. Human-related challenges, such as unplanned settlements, increasing population density in vulnerable areas, weak economic conditions, and a lack of coordination among disaster management agencies further complicate the situation. In remote, rural areas, the absence of modern technology and technical manpower, alongside resource constraints and low public awareness, become major obstacles to coping with recurring natural threats.

Therefore, our Disaster Risk Reduction Program addresses four critical, interconnected phases: Mitigation, focusing on preventing and minimizing the effects of disasters by constructing resilient infrastructure and promoting safe building codes; Preparedness, involving extensive planning, training, and drills to ensure communities know exactly how to respond when a disaster strikes; Rapid Response, guaranteeing the swift delivery of essential aid, rescue operations, and emergency relief to minimize immediate hazards; and Recovery, which includes both short-term rehabilitation and long-term Reconstruction and Sustainability initiatives to help communities ‘Build Back Better.’ By focusing equally on these proactive and reactive measures, VIN strives to minimize the overall risk of natural disasters and provide a durable foundation of safety and resilience for Nepal’s most vulnerable people.

VIN’s Comprehensive Risk Reduction Strategy

After the devastating earthquake of 2015, the entire nation was left in irreparable grief, sorrow, and deep scars on the economy and infrastructure. Realizing the scale of this disaster and the ongoing vulnerability of Nepal, VIN held up and initiated a comprehensive disaster relief and recovery project to support the earthquake victims, initially providing Emergency Relief in three districts of Nepal—mainly Kathmandu and Okhaldhunga.

Thereafter, the Earthquake Disaster Response and Relief program was systematically developed into three project phases: Rapid Rescue and Response (early intervention).

Rehabilitation (as a medium-term strategy.

Reconstruction and Sustainability (as a long-term project intervention). This framework effectively addresses the four major, internationally recognized disaster management phases:

Mitigation – This phase focuses on Preventing and minimizing the effects of disaster before they happen. VIN practices mitigation by training communities in safer building codes, constructing disaster-resilient infrastructure (such as earthquake-resistant community centers and schools), and implementing early warning systems for hazards like floods and landslides in vulnerable rural areas. This proactive stance is designed to reduce the physical and economic damage a future hazard might cause.
Preparedness – This involves Planning how to respond when a disaster is imminent or has just struck. VIN establishes and trains local Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR) committees within communities, conducting regular drills, first aid training, and ensuring the pre-positioning of essential emergency supplies. This ensures a coordinated and effective local reaction when government response may be delayed.
Rapid Response – This is the execution phase where the goal is to Minimise the hazards created by a disaster, rescue, and emergency relief. Immediately following the 2015 earthquake, VIN’s rapid response teams delivered immediate aid, including food, temporary shelter, clean water, and medical assistance, prioritizing the most isolated and marginalized households in their working areas.
Recovery – This long-term effort focuses on Building Back Better and Returning to the normal stage through short-term and long-term rehabilitation and reconstruction initiatives. For VIN, this involves sustainable infrastructure rebuilding, providing livelihood support, establishing micro-credit cooperatives for economic recovery, and offering psychosocial support to help affected populations regain self-reliance and mental health resilience.