In 2019, when the Risk-informed Early Action Partnership was launched at the United Nations Climate Action Summit, addressing the important linkages between early warning and early action to reduce the impact of climate hazards was not yet a mainstream phenomenon. Through its novel multi-stakeholder approach – connecting the humanitarian, development, and climate communities – REAP sought to close this gap by 2025, with the ambitious goal of “making 1 billion people safer from disaster by delivering new and improved early warning systems and helping communities prepare the plans and resources needed to respond when disaster strikes.”
At roughly the halfway mark in March 2023, REAP’s Governing Board commissioned the Global Public Policy Institute (GPPi) to conduct a detailed assessment of its internal environment (the Partnership Stocktake) as well as of the progress made in 2023 toward the goals of strengthening early warning and early action globally (the State of Play Report 2023). The primary objective of the Partnership Stocktake is to provide REAP stakeholders – the Partners, the Governing Board, the Secretariat, as well as other key stakeholders – with an assessment of REAP’s added value and its strengths, as well as any areas currently limiting REAP’s impact. Additionally, the Stocktake seeks to explore the Partners' perspectives on REAP's future direction and to propose strategies that will accelerate progress towards the Partnership’s 2025 goals.
Three main assessment questions have guided the Partnership Stocktake:
1) Is REAP’s general approach and specific partnership model suitable to help achieve its mission and goals?
2) Is REAP’s approach enabling a marketplace for early action that connects and scales up existing efforts on early warning and early action by diverse actors?
3) What contribution has REAP made towards scaling up early warning and early action?
This findings report answers these questions, providing a detailed assessment of the Partnership and informing the development of practical recommendations as the next step moving forward.