5. We further identify the close nexus between climate change and water-related disasters which account for almost 90% of the 1,000 most disastrous events since 1990. Therefore, we acknowledge that Integrated Water Resources Management is an effective way to strengthen resilience for disaster risk reduction and adaptation to climate change, and we invite other leaders and all stakeholders to join in this approach.
6. We recognize that the poor suffer disproportionately from natural and man-made hazards as poverty significantly undermines people’s socio-economic resilience to disasters, and disasters further erode livelihood and wellbeing and deplete resilience, thus exacerbating poverty and non-economic losses. Moreover, low-income households affected by disasters have a cut on food intake, health care and education expenditures, threatening their prospect of escaping poverty and amplifying the transmission of poverty from parents to children.
7. Globally, about one in seven people live in overcrowded, low-quality housing. Low-income households are particularly at risk as they usually live in hazard-exposed areas with low land value, deficient or non-existent infrastructure and services, low-quality and fragile dwellings and within degraded environments.
8. We note that the public and private sectors are interdependent when it comes to the development, functioning, maintenance and upgrading of infrastructure. Together they can reduce disaster risk and losses by ensuring that investment practices and regulatory frameworks are risk-informed, jointly planned, data are exchanged and an enabling environment is build.
The Opportunity
9. Over the next 40 years, more investment in infrastructure, including schools, hospitals, urban road construction, water and sanitation, energy and transport systems, and housing will be required than ever before. Some 60 per cent of the area expected to be urbanized by 2030 remains to be built and trillions of US Dollars are expected to be invested in new infrastructure annually. Meeting the needs of a global population that will reach nine billion by 2050, achieving the SDGs by 2030 and responding to the adverse effects of climate change will require considerable investments in resilient infrastructure, including green infrastructure and housing. While the cost of retrofitting infrastructure and building is often high, making new investment resilient is not and pays off over the long term.
10. We recognize that reducing losses attributed to disasters has short, medium and long-terms benefits and is essential to achieving economic and social development and environmental sustainability. Investing in disaster-resilient infrastructure, including disaster-reducing infrastructure, and adequate and safe housing as well as strengthening normative and regulatory frameworks, early warning and anticipatory forecast-based actions are an effective way to do so. Moreover, risk transfer mechanisms can help set the incentives for risk-informed investment.