Over the past two decades, Bosnia and Herzegovina has faced increasingly severe extreme weather events, including floods, droughts, and wildfires, with floods and landslides remaining the most frequent and damaging hazards. The intensity and frequency of floods have risen due to shifting seasonal precipitation patterns, with the May 2024 event marking the country’s most intense recorded rainfall. These disasters disproportionately affect families, businesses, and agricultural producers, with 75 percent of losses borne directly by them. Floods disrupt child-critical sectors such as health, education, social protection, and child protection, often forcing families to adopt negative coping strategies like selling productive assets or taking on debt, which deepen child poverty and disrupt access to essential services. Vulnerable populations—including children living in poverty, children with disabilities, Roma children, and children on the move—are particularly at risk, as they are more likely to experience interrupted schooling and reduced access to critical support services.
Although Bosnia and Herzegovina has established a normative framework for disaster risk management (DRM), the country’s complex governance structure—comprising two Entities and the Brčko District—creates coordination and implementation challenges. The fragmented social protection system hinders timely assistance for children, and DRM efforts remain largely reactive, focusing on infrastructure repair rather than proactive preparedness or socioeconomic impacts. Standard post-disaster damage assessments often overlook non-economic losses such as psychosocial trauma, stress, and social disruption, leaving affected families without comprehensive support.
To address these challenges, UNICEF and local partners developed a shock-responsive social protection (SRSP) system that integrates humanitarian response with long-term development. The SRSP model provides immediate cash assistance and essential services during sudden-onset climate events, targeting vulnerable families and children already registered for social assistance, those living in poverty, children without parental care, and persons with disabilities. By combining civil protection data with social vulnerability analysis, the system accounts for non-economic impacts, including psychosocial stress and learning loss, enabling a more holistic response beyond emergency cash support.
The SRSP model was implemented in 15 flood-prone locations, benefiting over 18,500 people, including children, and incorporated child-specific needs into strategic planning and contingency budgets. In 2023, the City of Bihać activated the model during local floods, delivering rapid cash assistance to over 1,000 individuals, including vulnerable children, while establishing a dedicated municipal budget to support future emergency responses. Children and families participated in crisis simulations and focus groups, helping ensure that DRM and social protection systems became more child-responsive and accessible.
The programme demonstrated that integrating DRM and social protection systems strengthens resilience, reduces negative coping strategies, and addresses both economic and non-economic losses. Cash transfers helped families meet immediate needs, protecting children from the long-term effects of poverty, disrupted education, and psychosocial stress. Horizontal coordination among social protection, disaster management, and local governance enhanced intervention effectiveness, while active community engagement reinforced sustainability.
Despite these successes, the programme identified ongoing gaps in sustainable income-generation, vocational training, entrepreneurship support, and market access, highlighting the need for stronger alignment between livelihood initiatives and SRSP interventions. Moving forward, UNICEF aims to integrate these achievements into national planning, strengthen vertical coordination, secure legal frameworks, and ensure predictable funding for local governments to deliver long-term, climate-resilient support for children and their communities.
