UNDRR News

The latest news from the United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction (UNDRR), the lead UN agency for the coordination of disaster risk reduction.

<b>Exhausted and sweaty: </b>Stuart Mawbey makes friends with a boy from a refugee family in west Sydney, who he describes as ‘a little charmer’,  after patching up the roof of their house in the wake of violent storms.
Stuart Mawbey is an emergency service volunteer worker and manager as well as a person living with disabilities. He has spent the last 15 years assisting in emergencies in the Australian States of South Australia and New South Wales. Here he reflects on the immense personal satisfaction he derives from his volunteerism as well as the ongoing challenges he faces as a person living with disabilities. As a volunteer with the State Emergency Service (SES) our primary role is to assist the community with floods and storms, however I have also participated in remote area search and rescue, forensic searches, bushfire assistance, traffic control and safety for community events.
United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction - Regional Office for Asia and Pacific
<b>Resilient character: </b>Firoz Ali Alizada soon after his amputations (left) and as an adult still wearing the same determined look to succeed and contribute in life.
Double amputee Firoz Ali Alizada believes that people living with disabilities are the biggest untapped resource for disaster planners around the world. The 31-year-old uses the example of his home country Afghanistan where people living with disabilities remain on the margins of decision making despite providing such a compelling example of day to day resilience.
United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction - Regional Office for Asia and Pacific
Deforestation on the Zambales mountain range, Philippines.  Photo by Flickr user treesftf
UNISDR Champion, Senator Loren Legarda, today announced she is proposing new legislation to tackle the problem of land degradation in the Philippines which is one of the most disaster-prone countries in the world.
United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction - Regional Office for Asia and Pacific
Silent alarm: Everybody running but deaf people are unaware of what's happening
Lydia Callis became an unlikely star of Superstorm Sandy as the sign-language interpreter during New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s televised press conferences on the storm. Time magazine reported in October 2012: “During Bloomberg’s televised press conferences on the storm — delivered in his standard business-like fashion — Callis translated his words with enthusiasm and passion. In fact, her presence at press conferences has provided New Yorkers with what New York magazine described as ‘a legitimate reason to smile’.”
United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction
Small Island Developing States will this week seek to plot a course to a safer and more resilient future as part of their preparations for a major conference next year. The Inter-regional preparatory meeting for the Third International Conference on Small Island Developing States (SIDS), which opens today in Bridgetown, Barbados, brings together nations from the three SIDS regions – Caribbean, Pacific and the Atlantic, Indian Ocean, Mediterranean South China Seas (AIMS) – to forge the way forward.
United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction - Sub-Regional Office for the Pacific
Lebanon’s innovative strategy seeks to balance corrective, prospective and compensatory action.
Lebanon is seeking to become the first country in the Arab region to adopt an overarching National Strategy for Disaster Risk Management that balances corrective, prospective and compensatory action.
United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction - Regional Office for Arab States
The long view: Dr Jimmie Rodgers is looking 50 years ahead to secure the future for youngsters such as these in Nagando Village, Fiji. (Photo: Sean Hobbs/Secretariat of the Pacific Community)
World-leading efforts to unite climate change adaptation and disaster risk management into one overarching strategy will provide ‘more bang for your buck’ a senior Pacific development leader says. The Director-General of the Secretariat of the Pacific Community, Dr Jimmie Rodgers, said future generations would judge today’s leaders on how bold their actions – not words – were in building safer and more resilient communities and countries.
United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction - Sub-Regional Office for the Pacific
The Conference of States Parties to the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities is the only human rights treaty of this millennium.
Why are persons with disabilities so disproportionately affected by disasters? This was the important, if often overlooked, question presented to the largest international meeting on disability issues, at the United Nations last week. The answer, simply put, is because disaster prevention measures are designed and implemented in many parts of the world without including or taking into account persons with disabilities. Often it is the attitude of viewing such persons as victims or burdens that prevents their inclusion.
United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction - New York UNHQ Liaison Office
Being heard: The survey explores the coping capacities of people living with a disability in the face of disaster.
The UN Office for Disaster Risk Reduction (UNISDR) and partners today launched the first-ever survey of people living with disabilities on their coping capacity in the face of a disaster event.
United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction
An innovative school director in northern Thailand has shown how his pupils can learn in safety with little additional financial cost and burden on staff.
United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction - Regional Office for Asia and Pacific

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