Planning for resilience to extreme weather events in Oman,2000-2015

Natural disaster risk is increasing globally (UNISDR et al., 2014), hence attention on disaster risk reduction has increased too. A key outcome of the Third World Conference on Disaster Risk Reduction (2015) was the Hyogo Framework for Action (HFA) (UNISDR, 2015a), a plan to increase community resilience to disaster. The disaster management system in Oman is new, with little research conducted to date, hence the five thematic areas of the HFA plus the component of resilience were used to create a framework to guide this research into understanding the level of resilience to disaster in Oman and how this could be enhanced. Understanding the recent performance of the relevant organisations is important to identify the strengths and the weaknesses of the disaster management system in Oman. Comparing the resilience performance of HFA components against the global average, and those in other Arab states helps to identify the real position of Oman in developing disaster resilience, and weaknesses that require attention. In the research, the hypothesis that disaster resilience performance was a function simply of national wealth and hazard frequency was rejected. Therefore, the factors impacting organisational performance with respect to resilience were investigated using Fuzzy Cognitive Mapping across a broad range of stakeholders. A conceptual model was then created from the identified variables based on the thematic areas of the HFA, from which the weakest and strongest areas of HFA performance in the disaster management system of Oman were identified, including consideration of how performance in one HFA theme area affects others. The research reveals a reactive disaster management system in Oman, and a need to improve prevention and preparedness. Finally, recommendations to improve community resilience to disaster in Oman are made.