Anticipatory action: Changing the way we manage disasters

Anticipatory action is a growing area of disaster management that relies on data analysis to predict where crises might strike and act ahead of time. The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) has been playing a vanguard role in bringing this kind of early, protective interventions into the mainstream of humanitarian programming. This brochure outlines in direct, non-technical language what anticipatory action is, how it works and why it makes a difference in the lives of people who are staring in the face of crises, be they caused by natural hazards, conflict or a mix of environmental and human factors.