[News] Building a Financially Resilient Sierra Leone - Workshop on Key Aspects of CDRF

Sierra Leone remains vulnerable to the financial impacts from a variety of disaster-related shocks and crises, including large annual floods, epidemics like Ebola, and man-made hazards such as severe fires. As a country, Sierra Leone is very reliant on ex post assistance for response and recovery. To support the Core Working Group of the Crisis and Disaster Risk Finance (CDRF) to develop a more financially resilient Sierra Leone, the first of three workshops was delivered by the World Bank Group (WBG) that engaged 15 stakeholders from across 12 ministries in Sierra Leone. 

The two-day workshop guided the working group on key aspects of CDRF through analysis and discussions on the scope and core principles of CDRF, the use of data and analytical tools and provided a deep dive into the different financial instruments available through the World Bank Group.

In 2020, the Ministry of Finance of Sierra Leone collaborated with the WBG to undertake a Crisis and Disaster Risk Finance diagnostic as a first step toward systematically planning for financial protection from future disasters. The key recommendations of the report, which can be accessed here, included strengthening post-disaster expenditure tracking, developing robust process for triggering a declaration of disaster and establishing prearranged financing mechanisms.

To enable this, the Government of Sierra Leone is in the process of developing a DRF strategy and Implementation plan. The strategy is being developed under the joint leadership of the Ministry of Finance and the National Disaster and Management Agency (NDMA) in close consultation with a Core Writing Group, which comprises of the Office of the National Security (ONS); National Commission for Social Action (NaCSA); Environmental Protection Agency (EPA); Ministry of the Environment (MoE); and Research Institute for Sustainability Transitions (RIST) – a civil society group.

The workshop held between October 12-13, 2022 in Freetown, Sierra Leone was calibrated to solicit technical inputs from the working group and to achieve a milestone in advancing the preparation of the DRF strategy. The program included technical presentations from the World Bank Group, Red Cross Climate Center, the Insurance Regulator of Sierra Leone as well as the ARC Group and ARC agency Services. Stakeholders worked through the DRF Stocktaking workbook to clearly outline their objectives, priorities, and action points towards the development of their DRF strategy. After 15 hours of intense brainstorming and discussion, group identified and formalized a high-level objective, granular development objectives and laundry list of potential financial instruments to include into the draft of their DRF strategy.

Click here to access the Sierra Leone Crisis and Disaster Risk Finance Diagnostic