UNDRR News

For two consecutive years the long-term disasters trend has been bucked by major earthquakes which claimed thousands of lives and affected millions in both 2010 and 2011, according to new statistics published today by CRED and the UN office for disaster risk reduction, UNISDR.

“In Sweden we have legislation that requires our communities, municipalities to work with a lot of aspects that are in the ‘ten essentials’ of the Making Cities Resilient campaign,” said Janet Edwards, International Coordinator of the Swedish National Platform for Disaster Risk Reduction, the body that brings together institutions in the country whose work touches on disaster risk reduction.

A major review of the 2010 and 2011 Pakistani floods is calling on donors to be more generous in their support for disaster preparedness and early recovery, and to help Pakistani NGOs to play a bigger role in crisis response.

Some of the biggest names in the U.S. private and public sectors gathered in New York on Wednesday at a Pace University Summit on Resilience to see how best partnerships between these two sectors could be developed to strengthen resilience in cities and communities in light of increasing hazards.

On the occasion of the two-year commemoration of the Haitian earthquake today, the UN Secretary General’s Special Representative on Disaster Risk Reduction, Margareta Wahlström, recognized the significant progress made over the last two years in dealing with the consequences of the disaster which took over 220,000 lives and left hundreds of thousands homeless.

Estimates of between $350 billion to $380 billion in global economic losses from disasters have made 2011 the most expensive year in history for catastrophes, according to the insurance industry.

UN Secretary-General, Ban Ki-moon, in a recent interview, highlighted the prevention of disasters and making the world safer among his 'five generational priorities' for his second term which began on Sunday.

Byblos, with its ancient port dating back 5,000 years, is dotted with Phoenician, Roman and medieval ruins along the waterfront that municipal authorities now fear are in danger from sea storms.

As the Thai capital, Bangkok, recovers from the worst flooding in a century, many are concerned that the disaster may be a sign of things to come amid a changing climate.

In an era of climate change, countries without national disaster prevention plans will find their cities and municipalities repeatedly engulfed by disasters, warned Philippine Senator Loren Legarda, UNISDR Champion for Disaster Risk Reduction and Climate Change Adaptation in the Asia Pacific, who said governments should not be “content with post-disaster relief and rehabilitation” alone.