Helping communities to recover
The Recovery Capitals research is helping relief agencies to identify people and communities’ unique needs after multiple disasters.
When Red Cross field staff went door to door to check on people’s needs after the Black Summer bushfires, their assessment was based on an organising framework and guide that helps target help in ways that are most effective.
Funded by the Centre, Recovery Capitals (ReCap) provides evidence-based guidance for disaster relief agencies, helping in decision making and encouraging strengths-based, holistic and inclusive approaches to recovery.
The research is used to guide those at the frontline to assess what people need based on seven areas of recovery – natural, social, financial, cultural, political, built and human – emphasising how these are all interconnected.
Erin Pelly, Red Cross’s National Manager for Recovery Emergency Services, says ReCap supports the organisation’s recovery planning and decision making, particularly in helping inform resource allocation and the design of its disaster recovery programming.
"It’s a powerful tool that supports recovery planners and decision-makers in anticipating potential issues and shaping effective responses," Ms Pelly says.
Professor Lisa Gibbs, the University of Melbourne researcher behind the project, says the recovery capitals framework is based on the understanding that a disaster experience affects every aspect of people’s lives.
For example, one community might be resilient to the mental health impacts of a disaster because it has strong social connectedness, while another might be more vulnerable financially if many households lose their source of income.
"Capturing information under each of the recovery capitals and then using the guide gives an evidence-informed sense of what’s likely to make a difference, very much based on the local context," Professor Gibbs says.
"It enables relief agencies to not only capture individual needs, but it also gives a sense of where things are at with the entire community."
The Recovery Capitals (ReCaps) Project was launched in 2018 to address the need for a holistic, evidence-driven approach to disaster recovery. University of Melbourne co-led the project with Massey University and Red Cross. They were supported by 21 government and non-government emergency management and recovery agencies and service providers across Australia and Aotearoa New Zealand who contributed to its development and endorsed it before its release in 2021.
ReCap has been used by NEMA and AIDR in their Community Recovery Handbooks, the Nous Group consultancy, Phoenix Australia Disaster Mental Health Hub, Victorian Emergency Recovery Resource Portal, the National Recovery and Resilience Agency and Resilience NSW, and was included in the University of Melbourne Foundations of Disaster Recovery short course for recovery policy makers and practitioners. This course has now been nominated by NEMA as compulsory training for their current and future operational staff.
Acknowledging our funders and partners: