. Boosting the Resilience of Infrastructure Assets and Planned Large-scale Infrastructure Investments in Four Caribbean SIDS through Risk-informed Infrastructure Asset Management Policies and Practices

The Caribbean is the second most hazard-prone region in the world, due to both its geographical location and the concentration of its population in coastal areas. Natural hazards range from hurricanes, floods and drought to volcanic eruptions, among others. Regular annual losses from disasters in the Caribbean are estimated at US$ 3 billion, with the infrastructure assets being heavily affected along with the social and production sectors. Disaster-related costs are expected to escalate in the Caribbean in the face of population growth, rapid urbanization, increased exposure of assets and climate-change-related phenomena (Bello and others, 2017). Since most of populations and assets in the Caribbean are concentrated in the coastal zone, governments and relevant stakeholders must improve their capacity to plan and manage their infrastructure assets including to incorporate risk management in sector planning and budgeting. 

The project aims to strengthen the resilience, sustainability and inclusiveness of infrastructure assets in selected SIDS through climate risk-informed infrastructure asset management policies and practices.  

Key activities include diagnostic assessments of suitability of existing infrastructure asset management policies and practices to assess and mitigate climate risks in support of national development objectives; developing Climate-resilient Infrastructure Asset Management Action Plans for priority infrastructure assets; integrating resilience measures; and developing Climate-risk informed Infrastructure Asset Management Policies applicable to entire asset portfolios at the local and national levels, with a strong focus on enhancing climate resilience in infrastructure management.