Diagnosis and discussions on Municipal Risk Reduction Plans in Brazil

Abstract

The disasters associated with landslides and floods forced the Brazilian Federal Government to launch, in 2003, a program aimed at encouraging the development of Local Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Plans (PMRRs - Planos Municipais de Redução de Riscos). Given the uniqueness of this action and the variety of institutions accounting for executing these plans, which involve different material and human resources, it is important explaining how PMRRs have been built in order to, likely, improve them. The aim of the current study is to gather information about all 33 PMRRs available on the website of the Ministry of Regional Development by focusing on the following items: composition of the technical team involved in them, popular participation, risk mapping, typologies and costs of proposed structural and non-structural actions. Among the herein reached conclusions, it is worth emphasizing the excessive asymmetry observed in PMRRs’ approach to physical aspects of this issue to the detriment of its social aspects, a fact that affects both the risk estimation method and the proposed mitigating measures.