Organised with financial support from the Republic of Korea, a key goal of this consultation was to accelerate the integration of disaster risk reduction into the ASEAN’s sectoral work plans. The consultation brought together representatives from around 20 divisions and organs of the ASEAN Secretariat, under the leadership of the Deputy Secretary-General of ASEAN for ASEAN Socio-Cultural Community, H.E. Kung Phoak.

While highlighting that “mainstreaming DRR across ASEAN sectoral work plans has been difficult, slow and challenging” Mr. Phoak asserted that “the ASEAN Secretariat is in a very strategic position to advocate a whole-of-society approach and seamless collaboration in advancing risk-informed sustainable development in the region” and described the consultation as “essential to create an enabling environment within the ASEAN Secretariat for a collective forward-thinking approach among different divisions, departments, and with ASEAN centres.”

With support from UNDRR, the assembled ASEAN Secretariat managers and representatives identified risks and challenges to the ASEAN Vision 2025, the means to address them, their respective roles and opportunities for cross-departmental partnerships with the Disaster Management and Humanitarian Assistance Division. Moreover, the consultation will contribute to shaping the disaster risk reduction and risk-informed sustainable development agenda in the new aadmer work programme and support ASEAN efforts in strengthening regional resilience.

“To achieve the objective of resilience, disaster risk reduction cannot be departmentalised but needs to be mainstreamed across all centres and work-streams. It is only then that the interconnectedness across risks can be addressed – preventing systemic risk requires a systemic approach”, said Dr. Animesh Kumar, Deputy Chief of UNDRR in Asia-Pacific, who led the UNDRR team, including the Global Education and Training Institute, that facilitated the discussions.

Date:

28 Nov 2019

Sources:

United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction - Regional Office for Asia and Pacific (UNDRR AP)

UN Office for Disaster Risk Reduction, Office in Incheon for Northeast Asia and Global Education and Training Institute for Disaster Risk Reduction (UNDRR ONEA-GETI)

Themes:

Disaster Risk Management

Regions:

Asia