Demystifying Compounding and Cascading Hazards in Anticipatory Action

We live in a complex and interconnected world, where humanitarian crises mirror this complexity. Anticipatory action (AA), or acting ahead of predicted hazards to reduce or prevent acute humanitarian impacts before they unfold, is a key approach for mitigating the impacts of forecastable hazards. Anticipatory action plans require use of pre-agreed triggers (thresholds and decision-making guidelines), pre-agreed activities, and pre-arranged financing. These plans are often based on single natural hazard forecasts coupled with vulnerability and exposure data. However, the reality is that the majority of contexts have multiple connected, cascading, or compounding hazards with limited access to timely data and scope for expert judgement that could better facilitate consideration of complexity for AA.