Welcome to our blog, the Human Righter. We shed light on contemporary human rights issues and comment on human rights developments. We dig deep into our focus areas within human rights, discuss SDGs and human rights. You will also find book reviews and analyses of new laws.
This blog post was written by Rachana Nary, Intern at the Phnom Penh Office
Disaster risk reduction is aimed at preventing new and reducing existing disaster risk and managing residual risk, all of which contribute to strengthening resilience and therefore to the achievement of sustainable development. – UNDRR
Since the environment on earth has been changing drastically due to climate change and hazards, early warning and early action are needed. Many people die, economics and businesses are at risk due to disasters including floods, storms, droughts, earthquakes and many other disasters happens almost every year. Thus, it is necessary for the world to take a precautious measurement now.
What is the International Day for Disaster Risk Reduction and what does it entail?
The International Day for Disaster Risk Reduction (IDDRR) was proclaimed by United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) as a day of promoting a global culture of disaster risk reduction. The Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction 2015-2030 was adopted in 2015 to focus on preventing and lessening global disaster risk and losses in lives. According to the Sendai Framework, Target G 2022 will be focused on “Substantially increase the availability of and access to multi-hazard early warning systems and disaster risk information and assessments to people by 2030.”
To assure the safety of every person, effective early warning systems must be alerted to all different kinds of hazards. It must be multi-hazard to detect all different hazards that might occur, end-to-end to detect the signal of hazard for at-risk people to take early action and people-centred to permit everyone to prepare and respond to the problems on time.
Nevertheless, preparation for early warning systems is costly and most developing and least developed countries are not able to build and/or expand them. Notably, one-third of the world’s people have not yet been covered by the early warning system where the majority are in Africa. Hence, the United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction (UNDRR) is exercising the 2022 IDDRR to call for investment and international assistance in expanding early warning and early action for everyone.
The IDDRR is about promoting a risk-free living environment from natural hazards. So, many activities such as launching campaigns, announcements, conferences or seminars related to disaster risk reduction covey a message to urge every global citizen to take action, by spreading the news and raising awareness of disaster risk reduction and taking care of the environment, usually implemented and shared widely on media. Thus, the day should always be a remembrance day that all people and all communities around the world ought to celebrate the reduction and prevention of disaster risks.
To read more about our work on disaster risk reduction please see our page on Human Rights and the Environment.
Additional links
Framework for Integrating Rights and Equality – FIRE
Building Resilience through Inclusive and Climate-Adaptive Disaster Risk Reduction
Featured image: @v2osk