NFPA Journal - Winter 2021 - 38

threats, including fire. In October
2020, it published a detailed report,
co-authored by Meacham as a consultant
for the World Bank, titled the
" Urban Fire Regulatory Assessment
& Mitigation Evaluation Diagnostic. "
The report contains a series
of pointed questions for a variety
of stakeholders, including government
officials and building owners,
designed to help them perform
self-assessments of their current practices
and regulations related to fire
safety. Campos Garcia said the World
Bank could also use the tool in the
future to conduct smaller-scale, more
focused assessments for governments
and their approaches to fire hazards.
" We don't always have to do a very
comprehensive regulatory capacity
assessment, " she said. " We might have
times that our government counterparts
are only interested in fire safety
or energy efficiency or accessibility.
The intention is to have a set of tools. "
No one is under any illusions that
an effort like the Building Regulation
for Resilience Program is a
cure for the chronic issues plaguing
developing cities, but it's a positive
start, and efforts are underway to
scale up the program's capacity. As
climate threats and urbanization
continue to accelerate, it's critical to
lay this important groundwork now,
Campos Garcia said. " This is a key
step in a long-term engagement that requires time to see
results, " she said-results that in 30, 40, or 50 years could
mean densely built urban environments that are safer from
fires, storms, and other hazards. -Jesse Roman
IV.
'HELPING COMMUNITIES
HELP THEMSELVES'
Embracing bottom-up approaches to regulation and
enforcement
While ambitious top-down projects at the governmental
level can potentially move the needle over a long period of
time, experts say it's only one of many strategies needed to
tackle building and life safety issues in these burgeoning
mega-cities. Some of those strategies push the boundaries of
conventional life safety paradigms. Other approaches obliterate
the boundaries altogether.
38 | NFPA JOURNAL * WINTER 2021
Buildings under construction in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.
Some experts advocate for building codes that take into
account the reality of local resources and are easier to
follow and enforce. GETTY IMAGES
One of those approaches is the possibility of developing
building codes and standards tailored specifically for developing
nations with regulations that are easier to follow and
enforce in countries where resources are scarce. Standards
developed in the West can be difficult for low-income nations
to implement for many legitimate reasons, experts argue.
Standards that are more targeted to the realities of the developing
world, the argument goes, would provide at least a
modicum of safety where none may exist.
The idea is explored in a recent paper, " Guidelines and
Principles for the Development of Building Regulations in
Low Income Countries, " published this year by the International
Building Quality Center, a think tank based at the
University of Canberra in Australia. " The IBQC Guidelines
are meant to serve as a tool to help governments incrementally
create building regulations that are appropriate to their
conditions, integrate home-grown solutions, and embraced
by citizens as tools that are understood to protect them and
their investments, " Judy Zagreski, vice president of global
services at the International Code Council, wrote in a recent
blog about the paper.
NFPA Journal - Winter 2021

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