The Rapid Environmental Assessment Tool (REA) is a methodology for rapidly assessing and analyzing the environmental context of a particular crisis or disaster.

When applied, it enables strategic and efficient response planning to mitigate identified priority environmental risks. The Rapid Environmental Assessment process has been successfully applied in numerous disasters for more than 20 years and was recently updated through the Joint Initiative to reflect the latest updates to the humanitarian planning process and to mainstream more recent concepts including climate risk, resilience and protection.

The 2018 Rapid Environmental Assessment includes new sections on disaster risk reduction, accountability to affected people and an updated section on gender, diversity and inclusion, and is presented in a new design.

Download the guidelines here.