From the dawn of civilisations, human society, the natural environment and disaster have been closely interlinked. Both natural disaster and the increasing environmental degradation world wide are serious threats to development. The key elements for development include investment, effective government and social stability. Unfortunately, disaster leads to exactly the opposite conditions. Loss of human made and natural capital causes sudden human disinvestments; post disaster relief increases both the financial and administrative burden on the government. Disasters also cause social distabilisation. Thus, the social view of sustainable development indicates that vulnerability to natural disasters is definitely a function of human action and behaviour.

For many years, the response to the disasters was mainly reactive. More recently, however, our attitude has been changed and the ‘response mechanism’, now, means a more elaborate proactive design to projects and policies at all levels. Disaster hurt people. They injure and kill and cause emotional trauma and stress. Destruction of homes, livelihood tools and economic activities cause hardship and spell financial ruins.

SHIS aims at reducing vulnerabilities of communities at risk to sudden disasters in most multi-hazard prone districts of West Bengal. SHIS is an instrument to increase capacity in the field of disaster management. Our strategy is to reach out in the difficult time with relief material, creating awareness for risk reduction, design training courses which can cater to the need of all the stakeholders.

The main objectives of the programme are to: