Canadian Red Cross and The Resilience Institute launch new program to promote readiness
18 Junio 2024 - 11:03AM
The Canadian Red Cross and The Resilience Institute are pleased to
announce a new partnership that aims to strengthen the climate
resilience of small, rural, and Indigenous communities across
Canada.
Roots for Resilience is a new pan-Canadian program
that will promote adaptive and risk reduction actions, while
elevating diverse voices across Canada to highlight the meaning of
resilience, agency and duty in the climate adaptation and disaster
risk reduction space.
By engaging small, rural, and Indigenous
communities across Canada, the Roots for Resilience team will work
with communities at their current level of readiness to address
climate change and risk reduction. The aim of the program is to
empower people and communities to better understand the risks and
challenges they face, with the goal to identify existing resources,
knowledge, and skills that can be leveraged to address these
challenges by taking informed action.
The Roots for Resilience initiative will take a
flexible, community-centered approach to building resilience,
including:
- Engagement: actively engaging with diverse
community members to set objectives, goals, and priorities for risk
reduction and climate adaptation, ensuring an equitable and
inclusive approach to bring diverse voices community to the
forefront;
- Planning: working together to better
understand and identify the unique risks, strengths, and
vulnerabilities that are specific to community members. Through
participatory and collaborative planning, identify opportunities
and actions to enhance individual and community resilience and
create a plan to advance resilience to climate impacts;
- Action: advance informed actions to reduce
risk by co-developing and implementing community-driven action
plans;
- Learning Together: growing stronger together
by encouraging reciprocal knowledge sharing on strengthening
approaches to resilience; and
- Inspiring: learning and sharing the attributes
which exemplify individual and collective strength through a
collection of diverse narratives and visual arts in the Stories of
Resilience – Voices across Canada activities.
The program is founded on the belief that
communities themselves are best placed to identify risks,
strengths, vulnerabilities, and the actions they need to take to
become more resilient in the face of climate change. Communities
must be at the centre of their own resilience journey.
Quotes:
“In the face of escalating climate crises,
complacency is not an option. The Roots for Resilience program
embodies our collective call to action, fostering community
empowerment and knowledge-sharing. By amplifying diverse voices,
especially those in small, rural, and Indigenous communities, we’re
addressing climate challenges, and also celebrating the resilience,
agency, and responsibility inherent in climate change adaptation
and disaster risk reduction.”Amy Avis, Chief, Humanitarian
Services, Canadian Red Cross
“This unique partnership with the Canadian Red
Cross epitomizes our commitment to reducing systematic barriers to
resilience and in strengthening proactive solutions to the complex
challenges of climate-induced disasters that are already wreaking
havoc on communities across Canada."Laura S. Lynes, President /
CEO, The Resilience Institute
“The Town of Hinton in partnership with the
Resilience Institute recently completed a Climate Risk Assessment
that validated much of what our community is already witnessing
when it comes to climate hazards. We are looking forward to an
ongoing partnership and in potentially developing a Climate
Adaptation Plan using a disaster risk reduction lens, that is
representative of diverse voices in and near our community.”Debbi
Weber & Winston Rossouw – Town of Hinton Strategic Projects
Team
"In the face of new and evolving climate threats
facing our community such as drought, wildfire, and the associated
impacts on food security and the safety of our people, the
activities through Roots for Resilience program are vital steps in
safeguarding our land, our culture, and our health and wellness for
generations to come.”Noreen Plain Eagle, Piikani Nation, southern
Alberta
“This collaboration has been instrumental in
creating opportunities for essential discussions and consultations
which help our Indigenous community move towards more effectively
adapting to and reducing the risk of climate related disasters in
our region. By having this dialogue built on grassroots, community
engagement in culturally sensitive ways—we see nothing but
continued success and growth through this initiative.”Patrick
Park-Tighe, Executive Director, People of the Dawn Indigenous
Friendship Centre (Stephenville, NFLD)
About the Canadian Red Cross:Here
in Canada and overseas, the Red Cross stands ready to help people
before, during and after a disaster. As a member of the
International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement – which is made
up of the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent
Societies, the International Committee of the Red Cross and 191
national Red Cross and Red Crescent societies – the Canadian Red
Cross is dedicated to helping people and communities in Canada and
around the world in times of need, and supporting them in
strengthening their resilience.
About the Resilience Institute:The
Resilience Institute is a national, charitable organization that
collaborates with diverse partners on knowledge co-creation and
applied research to minimize the suffering caused by climate change
impacts. A cornerstone of the Resilience Institute’s work is to
weave together multiple perspectives to strengthen strategies that
address the complex challenges of climate change. For more
information visit: resilienceinstitute.ca
Media Contacts:
Canadian Red Cross
English:
1-877-599-9602
French:
1-888-418-9111
The Resilience InstituteEnglish and French: Amica
Antonelliamica@resilienceinstitute.ca1-825-570-0431