United Nations recognises role of working animals in community disaster resilience
Anna Marry, Brooke’s Senior Global External Affairs Adviser, introduces a United Nations resolution which champions the vital role of working animals to communities, especially during disasters.
Working animals were used in a Nicaraguan disaster response simulation in 2023, thanks to Brooke and partners.
Imagine a flood hits your hometown. You are fortunate to be evacuated and taken to safety. But your beloved pet is not – they are left behind. No doubt you would be devastated by the loss.
Now imagine that this animal is also your only means of earning an income. Without it, you cannot feed yourself and your family, pay the bills or even get to the market.
The latter is exactly the scenario for millions of vulnerable people living in some of the poorest parts of the world. Their working horse, donkey or mule is their livelihood, their lifeline.
Across Asia, Africa and Latin America, working animals plough fields, carry water to households, transport produce to market, children to school and the sick to the doctor.
In those same parts of the world, climate-related disasters are frequent and on the rise: floods, droughts, earthquakes, hurricanes and volcanic eruptions.
More than 80,000 people and animals were helped by Brooke during Pakistan's 2022 flooding - the worst in its history.
If a working animal survives, it can work and help its owners and their families rebuild their lives and livelihoods. If it does not survive, people who are already very poor and vulnerable are plunged deeper into poverty.
Working animals play yet another important role in climate disasters. A donkey or a horse can get into disaster-struck zones with no vehicle access due to damaged roads or bridges, and help evacuate people, and get supplies and rescue workers in.
Longer term, working animals help rebuild destroyed infrastructure and aid economic recovery.
It is therefore vital that working animals, and other species of livestock, are protected before, during and after disasters.
Donkeys can help collect and carry water during periods of drought in Kenya, keeping entire communities afloat.
Brooke has been advocating for many years for the inclusion of working animals in national disaster risk reduction plans, with many successes, including in Guatemala and Nicaragua.
This year, we have achieved a major milestone in international policy. Thanks to Brooke’s advocacy, the United Nations General Assembly has adopted a resolution on disaster risk reduction which now formally recognises the vital role of livestock and working animals as key to disaster resilience for communities, and calls for their protection.
How did we do this? Throughout Brooke’s 90-year long history, we have always stood side by side with communities affected by disasters. We have helped evacuate their animals and ensured that their needs are met.
We then took this knowledge to policymakers, from national governments to the UN in New York, becoming a voice for communities in meetings with ministers, ambassadors and UN agencies.
We have presented evidence of the vital role of animals in disasters, and we have demonstrated a roadmap of how to protect these animals. And the UN has listened.
What does this resolution mean in practice? Simply put, once impelemented, it means that working animals can now be protected from death or injury during disasters.
They will be evacuated, taken to safety, provided with water, food and medical care.
They will live and will be able to work, lifting millions of people out of poverty every day.
There is more work to be done, especially to implement the resolution at national level so that every country has protective measures for these animals.
But today, we celebrate this incredible milestone - thank you, United Nations, for working with Brooke and being a champion for working animals!