Integrate Indigenous and Community Knowledge into Anticipatory Frameworks

• There ought to be mandatory integration of indigenous and local knowledge into modern Anticipatory Action (AA) protocols and early warning systems.
• Traditional indicators, such as cloud behaviour, wind patterns, glacial changes, and seasonal calendars observed in Chitral and Swat in Pakistan, and other regions, must be combined with scientific data through co-designed frameworks and community-led pilots.
• Policies should embed grassroots stakeholder engagement in national and sub-national strategies, ensuring community perspectives replace top-down approaches. This includes prioritising community training to position mountain residents as first responders, equipping them with tools and localised systems to overcome terrain-related delays.
• The loss and damage assessments must incorporate non-economic social, cultural dimensions, including erosion of traditions, norms, and community cohesion, to strengthen the culturally resonant and inclusive resilience.

Develop Gender-Responsive and Inclusive Adaptation Strategies

• Anticipatory Action (AA) must mandate women’s equitable participation at all stages of climate planning, implementation, and decision-making, building on the 2022 Gender Climate Change Action Plan.
• Targeted interventions should support marginalised groups, women, indigenous communities, and smallholder farmers through livelihood diversification, access to finance, and women-led committees for Water, Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH) and enterprise development.
• Inclusive mechanisms, such as women-led enterprises and self-assessment tools, are essential to address disproportionate burdens faced by these groups.
• Policies should promote nature-based solutions and early cash assistance that prioritise gender equity, ensuring actions are rooted in local leadership and essential services to overcome governance challenges in remote mountain areas.

Customise Early Warning Systems and Climate Modeling for HKH Specificities

• Early warning systems require urgent customisation for the HKH region’s unique mountain hydrology, microclimatic variability, and hazards like Glacial Lake Outburst Flood (GLOFs) and cloudbursts. This includes establishing regional centres (e.g., in Skardu/Gilgit-Baltistan in Pakistan) that integrate satellite technology, Artificial Intelligence (AI), end-to-end data analysis, and local expertise to enable minute-level response windows.
• Threshold-based triggers, linked to rainfall, temperature, snowfall, or glacial melt signals, must activate automated fund releases and forced evacuations.
• Risk communication should be translated into local languages, incorporating indigenous indicators to reduce false alarms and missed triggers.

Strengthen Institutional Capacity, Decentralisation, and Multi-Stakeholder Partnerships

• District and local institutions must be strengthened with cutting-edge technologies, contingency funds, and community patronage to shift from reactive to proactive paradigms.
• Full decentralisation to municipal levels, drawing lessons, e.g., from Nepal’s post-2015 federalism model, could be critical for ownership and rapid response, including revitalising District Disaster Management Authorities (DDMAs).
• A “whole-of-nation” approach should encourage and strengthen multistakeholder partnerships involving the National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA), the Provincial Disaster Management Authorities (PDMAs), the Sustainable Development Policy Institute (SDPI), the private sector, humanitarians, and academia for risk knowledge sharing, piloting, and policy trigger development.
• Systematic thinking tools, identifying disaster patterns, underlying structures, and inclusive language, should be adopted to bridge academic-policy jargon with community understanding, institutionalising anticipatory action as a core mandate rather than pilot projects.

Work on Innovative Financing and Risk Transfer Mechanisms

• Financing must pivot from reactive relief to dedicated anticipatory streams, including parametric insurance tailored to mountain livelihoods (crops, livestock, assets) and early cash assistance to protect assets before shocks.
• Risk financing solutions should leverage global climate funds, domestic resources, and municipal contingency budgets, with flexible mechanisms that make preparedness “visible” for future events.
• Policies should enforce a three-tier loss and damage framework: emergency relief, rehabilitation (with DRR integration), and resilience-building through anticipatory investments.
• Shifting resources towards resilient infrastructure over aid dependency is essential, supported by an upcoming Disaster Early Warning Tech Expo to showcase innovations.

Adopt Foresight Analysis and Multi-Scenario Planning

• All climate and Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR) policies must replace singular predictive forecasting with foresight analysis and multi-scenario planning that incorporates weak signals, critical uncertainties, and sociological, technological, economic, political, and ethical factors.
• National Determined Contributions (NDCs), National Adaptation Plans (NAP), and provincial/regional strategies should be updated to reflect multiple futures, moving beyond historical data assumptions that treat hazards as “sudden.”
• Establish formal compliance mechanisms which ensure that key policies transition from reactive documents to dynamic, forward-looking frameworks capable of operating under uncertainty

Promote Resilient Infrastructure and Nature-Based Solutions

• Investment in climate-resilient Water, Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH) infrastructure must be foundational, incorporating solar-powered systems, source protection, rainwater harvesting, and groundwater recharge to withstand shocks and support health, nutrition, and household economies.
• Holistic watershed management through nature-based solutions, vegetation cover, slope stabilisation, and organic farming ought to be prioritised to mitigate upstream erosion and downstream floods.
• Community risk mapping, business continuity plans, and slope stabilisation initiatives should be scaled, linking WASH resilience to broader anticipatory goals and reducing service disruptions during hazards.

Strengthen Regional Collaboration and Transboundary River-Basin Approaches

• Anticipatory action in the HKH demands a holistic river-basin approach across ten major basins, integrating hydrology, geomorphology, land use, and socioeconomics from glaciers to deltas. Regional trust-building through joint simulations, data sharing, and multilateral platforms is essential to overcome transboundary barriers (e.g., India-Pakistan coordination). Geopolitical and sociopolitical dimensions must be addressed via locally owned systems, flexible finance, and inclusive protocols that ensure resilience in one country benefits all.
• High-level councils should enforce updated DRR and climate strategies with anticipatory pillars, securing dedicated finance streams for long-term ecosystem and livelihood resilience across Pakistan, Nepal, and beyond.