A wide angle view of the plenary session to declare open the Global Platform for Disaster Risk Reduction

By Denis McClean

GENEVA, 15 May, 2019 - The Global Platform for Disaster Risk Reduction opened in Geneva today with the focus on raising levels of ambition when it comes to reducing disaster risk in a world where vulnerability and exposure is dramatically on the rise.

Four years after the adoption of the Sendai Framework – the global plan to reduce disaster losses - 116 UN Member States are reporting against the seven targets including those for reducing mortality, reducing the numbers of people affected, economic losses and damage to critical infrastructure.

Speaking on the opening day, the UN Secretary-General’s Special Representative for Disaster Risk Reduction, Mami Mizutori, said while there is promising progress in many areas “time is running out for a world at risk…threats that were considered inconceivable, no longer are.”

At the Welcome Ceremony, she said: “Over the first four years of the Sendai Framework we have also seen how prescient it was that the text expanded the traditional limits of disaster risk reduction beyond natural hazards to include man-made hazards as well as related environmental, technological and biological hazards and risks.”

Ms. Mizutori called for accelerated efforts to implement the Sendai Framework and lamented the fact that “the bar is being raised for resilience with every day that passes without progress on reducing greenhouse gas emissions into the atmosphere.”

She continued: “One vital sign of the Sendai Framework’s ability to impact on the world will be the achievement of target (e) by next year when we want to see a substantial increase in the number of national and local strategies for disaster risk reduction.

“The composition and implementation of these strategies will also be clear evidence of the DRR community’s commitment to coherence with other elements of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development including the Paris Agreement and the SDGs.”

Global Platform co-chair, Manuel Sager, Secretary of State, Switzerland, said: “Our conference this week will focus on key elements for achieving the targets of the Sendai Agenda and the SDGs: taking stock of progress made, risk-informed investment, and the impact of climate change.

“We all know, investment in DRR yields multiple benefits in averted losses. But, we have to act on this knowledge and increase DRR in our development work with more determination.”