JYOTIRAJ PATRA and SUDARSHAN CHHOTORAY
Odisha has been a pioneer in natural disaster management, including preparedness and response. Since the devasting Odisha Super Cyclone of 1999, the state has systematically invested in capacity enhancement, technologies and infrastructures at various levels of governance by adopting a whole-of-government and inclusive approach. All these have been underpinned by strong political leadership, administrative acumen and community ownership.
But in recent years, the state is facing an unprecedented array of climate-induced hazards such as heat stress, extreme rainfall events leading to large scale flooding and water-logging in cities, landslides and frequent vector-borne disease outbreaks. The recent case of extreme rain-induced landslides in Gajapati district is a case in point.
Large section of the state’s population is engaged in climate-sensitive sectors like agriculture, fisheries and animal husbandry. Earlier this year, the state government declared ‘untimely rainfall’ as a natural disaster. As part of this, it distributed Rs 291 crore as compensation to 6.66 lakh farmers who suffered crop losses across 16 districts. This was from the State Disaster Relief Fund (SDRF). Monsoon-induced flooding in major river systems in northern Odisha in July and August this year inflicted large scale crop loss and damaged habitations and other vital infrastructures such as roads across 170 villages.
Scientific assessments clearly indicate an increasing trend in the frequency and intensity of extreme weather events such as precipitation, heat waves, flooding and cyclone events. As per the State of Climate in Asia (2024) prepared by the World Meteorological Organization (WMO), Asia is warming nearly twice as fast as the global average, with 2024 recorded as one of the hottest years on record for the region. A scientific assessment by IIT Mandi and IIT Guwahati (December 2024) found many districts of Odisha with high vulnerability to climate impacts such as flood and drought. This increasing vulnerability poses significant challenge to the state’s economy and its overall development, investments and development gains across sectors.
The state’s ambition to become an USD 1.5 trillion economy by 2047 has promoted investments, both public and private, in infrastructure development across manufacturing and services sectors in various parts of the state. These investments need to integrate the evolving climate and disaster risks in their planning and execution to protect the vital assets and resources.
There is an urgent need to invest in climate and disaster resilience building initiatives in key sectors such as agriculture and allied sectors, urban, health, water resources, infrastructure like roads, railways and telecommunication and banking. The Odisha Vision 2036 and 2047 document outlines specific plans for such resilience building actions across different sectors.
As resilience building is a whole-of-government and whole-of-society iterative process, we propose three specific action areas for the state.
Firstly, there should be strong institutional coordination mechanisms in place to understand the evolving climate and disaster risk context in the state. This is crucial have a shared understating of the risk context, including the cross-sector inter-linkages and cascading impact of a hazard such as flood or landslides across sectors. For example, there are specialised administrative units such as the Odisha State Disaster Management Authority (OSDMA) under the Revenue and Disaster Management Department, the State Climate Change Cell under the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change and other central agencies such as the Central Water Commission (CWC) and Indian Meteorological Department (IMD), to name a few. In addition, multiple research organizations, NGOs and think tanks are engaged in climate change and disaster resilience research in the state. Many bilateral and multi-lateral development agencies and financial institutions such the Asian Development Bank (ADB), the Coalition for Disaster Resilient Infrastructure (CDRI), different United Nations agencies, philanthropies like the Gates Foundation, private corporate foundations and others are supporting climate resilience projects in different departments like urban infrastructure, agriculture, energy and water resources. For resilience planning to be successful and inclusive, there should be a state-level multi-stakeholder platform for systematic integration of the learnings, insights and ideas for more synergistic and converged actions.
Secondly, investments and decision, both public and private, should be risk-informed to reduce potential loss and damage from potential climatic impacts. This will entail more knowledge and capacity enhancement across levels governments, private sector, including financial institutions, elected representatives and institutions at local levels and communities and NGOs. Special emphasis should on knowledge and capacity building of local actors and institutions such as Panchayat Raj Institutions (PRIs) and Urban Local Bodies (ULBs). The Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction (SFDRR, 2025-2030) clearly outlines guiding principles on multi-hazard approach and inclusive risk-informed decision-making at various levels of government.
Thirdly, priority should be on building resilience of communities, local youth, women groups and village and Urbal Ward level institutions. The effective capacity building exercise, information dissemination and strengtheing coordination with Government line departments would do wonder in responding emergency situations like flood, cyclone, lightening, Tsunami and like any climate emergenices.
Apart from all these, bringing synergy in targetted Government programmes and schemes of different departments and integrating climate and disaster resilience components in all those schemes both at operational level and policy-framework level would definitely pave way for achieving mitigation targets and facilitating adaptation.
We hope such a multi-pronged approach will help build Odisha’s climate and disaster resilience capacities at various levels and this in turn will be a catalyst for a Viksit and Resilient Odisha 2036 and 2047.
(Jyotiraj Patra is Regional Representative Asia for Simavi and Sudarshan Chhotoray is the Director of Focus Odisha Foundation)
