The earthquakes damaged or destroyed more than 80% of Government buildings in the West Sumatra capital, Padang. Officials lost equipment, files and, tragically, even some colleagues. Within days UNDP had supplied temporary offices, in the form of tents and some basic office equipment, enabling some of the critical services to get back to work. The focus now is on boosting the capacity of local and regional government to meet the growing recovery and ultimately to reduce the impact of disasters in West Sumatra.   

Activities include:

• Supporting the immediate rehabilitation of basic government functions by providing offices, equipment and advisors in planning, monitoring, IT and other critical areas (1 – 3 months).
• Supporting the ongoing response and to adjust local programme planning, implementation and reporting through technical assistance (3 – 6 months).
• Supporting longer term governance recovery, with a strong focus on engaging communities to become involved in planning and monitoring recovery in their areas (6 – 24 months).

As people dismantle damaged buildings in urban and rural areas, the problem of removing mountains of earthquake rubble is growing. At the same time, construction is expected to boom over the next year in West Sumatra. UNDP is focused on supporting the government to firstly remove damaged buildings and rubble safely and recycling some of the debris into building materials. The aim is to provide cheap building materials so that demand for precious wood is reduced, along with deforestation.

Activities include:

• Structural assessments of damaged public or publicly accessible buildings.
• Demolish destroyed or severely damaged public or publicly accessible buildings.
• Assist communities to safely remove their damaged homes.
• Recover, recycle and dispose of some waste and debris.
• Disposal of hazardous materials encountered during demolition (e.g. asbestos).
• Review building codes and practices for environmentally sustainable resource use.

The earthquake damaged or destroyed almost 200,000 homes in West Sumatra. The local government plans a community housing reconstruction scheme. The plan is to form groups and disburse funds to these groups for rebuilding homes. UNDP, together with UN-Habitat, will support the provincial government by improving the supply chain of appropriate raw materials, as well as introducing techniques for building disaster resistant housing.

Activities will include:

• Reviewing and promoting building codes for earthquake safe buildings.
• Experimenting and promoting earthquake resistant building materials and techniques, also constructing model houses.
• Ensuring adequate monitoring for compliance and at the same time assist the relevant department to recover and replace land ownership records.
• Together with ILO, train skilled artisans in construction techniques using (where appropriate) new technologies, materials and designs.
• Conducting public awareness campaigns on earthquake proof buildings.
• Preparing land use plans and approval of building plans to keep settlements away from unstable slopes.

UNDP coordinates early recovery across the UN and partner NGOs at the national and provincial levels. In this capacity, UNDP has already worked with national and provincial governments in undertaking assessments and developing recovery plans. At the same time, integrating early recovery and disaster risk reduction across sector planning.

As part of this work, more than 500 people across the six affected districts were interviewed as part of the Government’s Post Disaster Needs Assessment. A key priority for many is learning how to construct earthquake resistant housing. The survey results will help government, civil society and the international community to focus their recovery support on the priorities of communities attempting to rebuild their lives. This survey tool, known as the Human Recovery Needs Assessment (HRNA), will continue as a community monitoring and planning tool, enabling communities to inform government about their perspectives on activities and progress.