UNDRR News

Schoolchildren and businesses in Japan are working hard to implement the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction, a 15-year blueprint adopted at a UN conference in their country in 2015.

Hundreds of university students from around the world have set their sights on reducing the risk of disasters, during the first-ever edition in Japan of the National Model United Nations.

Hundreds of high school students from around the world have pledged to step up efforts to reduce disaster risk, at a global gathering held to mark the first edition of World Tsunami Awareness Day.

The role of the private sector in making societies resilient to disasters and ensuring development is sustainable has been spotlighted as part of events commemorating the fifth anniversary of the 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake and Tsunami.

This week last year the Third UN World Conference on Disaster Risk Reduction was preparing to adopt the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction on March 18, 2014. The new head of UNISDR, Mr. Robert Glasser, has just paid his first visit to Sendai.

The head of the UN Office for Disaster Risk Reduction, Mr. Robert Glasser, today attended the fifth anniversary memorial service for those who lost their lives in the Great East Japan Earthquake and Tsunami of March 11, 2011.

The International Recovery Platform was established after the 2nd UN World Conference on Disaster Risk Reduction in 2005 to support implementation of the Hyogo Framework for Action. The Sendai Framework has given it a new lease of life with a focus on sharing experience and lessons associated with build-back-better.

The head of the UN Office for Disaster Risk Reduction, Margareta Wahlström, today welcomed the passing of a resolution yesterday by the UN General Assembly which recognizes November 5 as World Tsunami Awareness Day. The resolution was led by Japan and Chile.

Japanese members of the UNISDR Private Sector Alliance for Disaster Resilient Societies, known for short as ARISE, are moving ahead with implementation of the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction, the global blueprint for reducing disaster losses adopted at a UN conference in Japan earlier this year.

The world’s first hybrid dam, combining both earth and concrete, is also earthquake proof and protects millions of people living on Japan’s vulnerable Toyama plain from a repetition of a major disaster which occurred there in the mid-19th century.