disaster reduction

The UN chief saw for himself the deadly power of Hurricane Dorian on the shattered islands of Abaco and Grand Bahama on Saturday, describing it as more like a “Category Hell” disaster, than the official Category 5 designation used by meteorologists. 

Climate-related and geophysical disasters such as earthquakes and tsunamis have killed 1.3 million people over the last 20 years and left a further 4.4 billion injured, homeless or in need of emergency assistance, UN experts said on Wednesday.

Lacking both early-warning systems and risk-reduction budgets, medium-sized towns in Africa are poorly equipped to respond to emergencies provoked by natural disasters, rural-urban migration and ecosystem destruction, a United Nations report released today says.

The top United Nations relief official today lauded the Government of Bangladesh’s efforts to enhance its disaster risk reduction, adding that the country boasted one of the most formidable disaster preparedness programmes in the world.

The head of the United Nations office for disaster risk reduction has welcomed the mass earthquake drill organized by Indian authorities in Delhi yesterday and encouraged all high seismic cities to follow the city’s example to better prepare for possible catastrophes.

China must play a leading role in reducing the impact of natural hazards, a senior United Nations official said today, adding that private sector partnerships can significantly help to increase businesses’ ability to deal with and recover from disasters.

2010 was one of the deadliest years for natural disasters in the past two decades and unless better preparations are put in place now, many more disasters can be expected in years to come, the UN’s top disaster reduction official said today.

With unpredictable and extreme weather the “new normal,” both developed and developing countries must plan ahead by anticipating the consequences of development or face increasing economic losses, according to the United Nations disaster mitigation secretariat.

The heavy snowfall that recently immobilised cities in Europe is an indication that the world may be ill prepared to cope with unpredictable climate patterns, a senior United Nations said today, calling for greater efforts to improve readiness to respond to extreme weather events.

Parliamentarians from 10 Asian countries have urged governments in the region to allocate at least one per cent of their national budgets to projects designed to strengthen disaster risk reduction, the United Nations International Strategy for Disaster Reduction (UNISDR) said today.