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On the occasion of the International Day for Disaster Reduction, held every 13 October, the FEEM’s Initiative on Climate Change policy and Governance (ICCG) is pleased to announce the outcomes of the 2017 Best Climate Practices Award on “Building resilience to climate disaster risk”.

The project “Balangay Legazpi” is the winner of the Best Climate Practices 2017 Award. Balangay Legazpi is a free cloud-based information system to help communities in Philippines prepare for natural calamities, reducing exposure and vulnerability to disaster risk. The developer is a young web agency, Layertech Software Labs which aim is to create socially relevant, tech-based solutions. First implemented in the City of Legazpi, Balangay mobile and web application provides a real-time platform for reliable communication between local government units, academy, private sector, civil society organizations (CSOs), non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and affected communities. 

The first Special Mention of the Jury was assigned to the project “Amphibious Housing, a building method promoted by the Canadian Buoyant Foundation Project and applied in Vietnam’s Mekong Delta, a region experiencing increasingly unpredictable and destructive flooding. The project Amphibious Housing was given a Special Mention because of its innovative application of technologies to enhance resilience in flood-prone areas. A second Special Mention of the Jury has been granted to the project “Promoting Water Stewardship for water and food security in semi-arid regions“, for its behavioral approach addressing the social inclusiveness dimension of Disaster Risk Reduction and for its capacity to increase active engagement of communities living in water-scarce regions. The Water Stewardship Initiative is developed by Watershed Organization Trust and includes water budgeting, micro irrigation for agriculture, weather-related crop-advisories delivered to farmers via SMS and daily monitoring of rainfall through rain gauges.

Find out more about the 2017 BCP Award outcomes!