Crisis Assessment
   Series
   SYRIA




                                                                                                                         Photo credit: © Richard Harvey | Dreamstime.com
Context

T                                                   GFDRR’s role
      he Syrian crisis has devastated the




                                                    T
      country and set it back decades in terms
                                                          he ongoing conflict in Syria posed a unique challenge
      of development. The Syria Information
and Research Initiative (SIRI) was designed to            where the damage assessment had to be conducted
respond to the main challenges represented                without having any presence on the ground. Therefore, the
by the Syrian conflict and offer an innovative      GFDRR assessment team developed an innovative methodology
solution to the problem of coordinating             to assess damages in a remote manner using satellite imagery
humanitarian and developmental efforts across       analysis, social media analytics and data mining. Social media
World Bank Group (WBG) and other development        analytics played a major role in this assessment to validate the
partners. As part of this initiative, a damage      damage information gathered from satellite imagery analysis.
assessment was conducted in the Syrian city         Market expertise was solicited to do this analysis under the
of Dar’a. Following this assessment the World       guidance of GFDRR and the World Bank sector teams. The
Bank’s Middle East and North Africa (MENA)          GFDRR team also developed an accuracy rating metrics as
regional team requested GFDRR support to            part of this assessment to get a better understanding of the
conduct a damage and needs assessment for
                                                    confidence level of the final damage data.
six Syrian cities.
                                                    The GFDRR team led the project with the key objective to be the
The objective of this assessment was to
                                                    silo breakers eliciting a multitude of sector specialists from the
estimate the effects of the crisis on the
                                                    World Bank Global Practices. These specialists contributed to the
population, infrastructure, and service delivery,
and understand the preliminary recovery needs.      assessment with background context, data verification, analysis
                                                    of damage characterization, impact on service delivery, and
                                                    sector recommendations.
               Total damages for the
             six cities range between

              US$5,962
            to
               US$7,287
                       million

Published April 2016
Crisis Assessment Series
SYRIA


Key Results
➊	 A preliminary report that identifies:
    (1) quantitative range of estimates of the
    physical damages to key public and private
    assets in the selected sectors including:
    housing; education; health; water and
    sanitation; energy; and transportation; for the
    cities of Dar’a; Aleppo; Homs; Hama; Idlib,
    and; Latakia; (2) the impact of the crisis on
    associated service delivery; (3) key elements
                                                            Aleppo, Syria. Photo credit: © Richard Harvey | Dreamstime.com
    of an enabling environment and infrastructure
    needs to motivate Internally Displaced
    Persons (IDPs) return to their place of origin.         GFDRR developed an innovative methodology to assess Syria’s
                                                            crisis damages remotely using satellite imagery and social
➋	 A GIS based data visualization and sharing               media analytics.
    platform was created to facilitate data
    analysis and sharing. The platform allowed
    the teams to convert the large sector data sets                 TOTAL VALUE OF DAMAGES BY SECTOR FOR SIX CITIES
    into easily understandable visuals over the                                 (US$ M as of March 2016)*
    base map of each city.
                                                            Sector                                        LOW ESTIMATE                    HIGH ESTIMATE

➌	 The work conducted in the Syria DNA activity             Education                                            176                              215
    provided an internal watching brief to the              Energy                                             1,182                            1,445
    WBG leadership. It positions the WBG to be              Health                                               321                             392
    prepared to mobilize quickly in the event that          Housing                                          4,056                             4,958
    hostilities reduce to operable developmental            Roads                                                128                              156
    activity levels. An update was carried out              WATSAN                                               99                                121
    establishing new damage data reflecting the
                                                            Total                                           5,962                             7,287
    current status of the assessed cities as of
    March 2016.
                                                            *	 Damage estimates of physical infrastructure using historical unit cost.
➍	 GFDRR leveraged its relationship with its                   Reconstruction needs would be higher due to inflation, security premium,
                                                               scarcity of material/labor, etc.
   partners which will also prove valuable
   in obtaining a situation awareness as the
   conflict evolves, and provide insight on areas
   that require prioritization in a post-conflict           Aleppo is the most affected
   recovery scenario.                                       city accounting for roughly

➎	 The assessment techniques and innovative
    methodology pioneered by this activity
                                                            58%            of the estimated
                                                                           damages

    informed a subsequent Iraq damage appraisal
    that was conducted through GFDRR support in
    a record time of ten days.
                                                                                                                  Latakia
                                                                                                                  is experiencing increased
                                                                                                                  pressure on infrastructure and
                                                                                                                  services from the influx of IDPs.
                                                      Photo credit: © Nenad Mihajlovik | dreamstime.com      Photo credit: © Nenad Mihajlovik | dreamstime.com