Drought Plan Monitor

Translating drought policies into action is one of the greatest challenges in drought risk management. Knowing what is being implemented, by whom, and with what resources is essential to bridge the gap between planning and results. Systematic frameworks to track and monitor drought plans and policies, however, remain largely absent, hindering the assessment of progress, the identification of gaps, and the connection of planned actions to concrete outcomes on the ground.

To address this gap, FAO developed the Drought Plan Monitor, an interactive platform to support the design, documentation, and monitoring of drought management plans. Building on the Drought Classifier, a framework elaborated by FAO to organize interventions and enabling environment activities across sectors and scales, the Monitor enables countries and organizations to build structured drought assessments, bringing together mitigation actions, funding arrangements, and policy alignment in a single, coherent framework.

The platform guides users through a step-by-step process:

Plan – Identify drought mitigation actions across relevant plans and policies and classify them into interventions or enabling activities. Link funding sources, responsible agencies, and relevant national and international policy frameworks to each activity.

Monitor – Track implementation progress over time by setting measurable indicators and targets for each mitigation action, and updating progress as plans are put into action.

The Drought Plan Monitor is designed for national drought focal points, planning agencies, and development practitioners involved in building drought-resilient countries and food systems.