Washington DC, June 11, 2021¡ª ľ¹ÏÓ°Ôº today approved US$100 million in additional financing to help Morocco strengthen its ability to withstand the impact of natural disasters. The extra financing will be used to scale up an existing US$200 million Integrated Disaster Risk Management (DRM) and Resilience program by improving the country¡¯s institutional capacity for disaster risk management and risk-reduction investments.
¡°Protecting the people and economy against natural hazard can save Morocco over US$800 million a year,¡± said Jesko Hentschel, World Bank Maghreb Country Director. ¡°Developing more resilience to the risk of natural disaster is a critical investment given Morocco¡¯s exposure to climate-related risks. The financing will be used to continue the results-driven DRM program, with the aim of protecting the country¡¯s most vulnerable populations.¡±
Over the past decade, Morocco has improved its institutional, policy, and investment framework for disaster risk management. To build up its financial resilience as well, it launched a solidarity fund to alleviate the financial impact of natural disasters on households and businesses and design a set of instruments to reduce the State¡¯s financial exposure to risk.
¡°The focus of this new operation will be to strengthen the impact of risk reduction investments and enhance the monitoring and evaluation of investments,¡± said Philipp Petermann, Disaster Risk Management Specialist and Task Team Leader. ¡°The program will accelerate results on the ground by building on reforms the Kingdom has been implementing with the support from the World Bank. It will also seek to promote a gender-inclusive approach to managing disaster risk.¡±
The parent program has contributed to strengthening the country¡¯s resilience to natural disasters already, with outcomes that include turning an emergency fund for post-disaster response into a national resilience fund that currently co-finances more than 150 strategic investments to reduce climate-related risks, ranging from flood protection infrastructure to early warning systems, hazard mapping and capacity building. The parent program has also supported a national disaster risk management strategy, thus taking another step to fortify Morocco¡¯s institutional framework for disaster and climate-related risk management.
ľ¹ÏÓ°Ôº has been stepping up its DRM support to Morocco over the past few years, offering support ranging from financial assistance to advanced technical advice. A contingent credit line against catastrophic risks, approved in 2019, was fully disbursed in April 2020 to support the Government of Morocco¡¯s response to the Covid-19 crisis.
