While heterogeneous and diverse, rural populations in developing and emerging contexts share a number of commonalities, in terms of, for example, their relation to agriculture as a core source of income and livelihood stability, the elevated poverty levels they face and their considerable exposure to a variety of different risks (e.g economic, social, environmental and health-related risks), as well as their limited capacity to cope with these shocks. The combination of these aspects makes rural populations extremely vulnerable to the effects of climate change and the associated increased risk exposure to natural hazards, which pose a growing threat to their livelihoods and way of life. In the frame of disaster risk management and the mitigation of vulnerability to climate change, social protection systems can play a fundamental role at systemic level in bridging the gap between emergency, post-disaster measures, and longer term development interventions that focus on rehabilitating rural populations’ livelihoods. Following FAO’s definition, a social protection system is “a set of policies and programmes that address economic, environmental and social vulnerabilities to food insecurity and poverty by protecting and promoting livelihoods”.

Source - www.fao.org