8 / 156
[
]8
O
VER THE PAST
two years, there has been no shortage of
reminders that reducing risk and improving the manage-
ment of natural hazards must be given the highest
priority. The need for a global disaster reduction strategy has been
underscored by a string of disasters ranging from the Indian
Ocean tsunami, to droughts in Africa; from hurricanes roaring
onto American and Caribbean shores to typhoons triggering land-
slides in Southeast Asia; from fires and floods in Europe to
earthquakes in Pakistan and Indonesia. Last year alone, 92,000
people lost their lives in disasters and close to 160,000 were
affected overall.
2
At the heart of the United Nations’ efforts to reduce the serious
and growing impact of natural hazards on communities and coun-
tries lies the International Strategy for Disaster Reduction (ISDR).
It was launched in 2000 following an International Decade dedi-
cated to the subject of Natural Disaster Reduction (IDNDR,
1990-1999) with an ISDR secretariat and an inter-agency task
force. Today, this effort has advanced into a much wider system
of commitments and platforms on specific subjects, in many
regions and involving many nations.
What is being done to prevent more death and destitution?
A significant step towards more action and commitment was taken
just a few weeks after the tsunami claimed over 250,000 lives. In
January 2005, 168 governments gathered in Japan at the second
UN World Conference on Disaster Reduction and adopted the
Hyogo Framework for Action 2005-2015: Building the Resilience
of Nations and Communities to Disasters. The Framework lays
out a detailed ten-year plan to make risk reduction an essential
component of development policies and programmes.
The Hyogo Framework commits governments as well as regional,
international, and non-governmental organizations (NGOs) to:
1. Ensure that disaster risk reduction is a national and local
priority
2. Identify, assess and monitor disaster risks and enhance early
warning
3. Use knowledge, innovation and education to build a culture
of safety and resilience at all levels
4. Reduce the underlying risk factors
5. Strengthen disaster preparedness for effective response at all
levels.
The challenge is to turn these priorities into practical measures
and produce measurable results in disaster reduction. The
overall goal is to substantially reduce loss of life and damage to
the social, economic and environmental assets of communi-
ties.
All too often, disasters are perceived and responded to as
singular ‘events’ rather than manifestations of complex natural
and human systems at work. Yet, a disaster is more than just
the inevitable consequence of some natural event. It is the result
of human exposure and vulnerability. When a tropical cyclone
hits a deserted beach, it does not create disaster. But when it
strikes an area populated with fishing communities living in
thatched roof homes, the number of fatalities and economic
losses surge.
Although the most vulnerable communities are found in devel-
oping countries, no country, poor or rich, is immune from
disasters – as was demonstrated by Hurricane Katrina and the
2005 floods in Europe. In less developed countries, however,
disasters are stunting (and often reversing) social and economic
progress, thus inevitably widening the gap between the ‘haves’
and ‘have-nots.’ The World Bank calculated that in the 1990s,
the average economic cost of any large-scale disaster in low-
V
ISION WITHOUT ACTION IS BUT A DAYDREAM
,
BUT
ACTION WITHOUT VISION IS A NIGHTMARE
” – A
GLOBAL
FRAMEWORK FOR REDUCING RISK OF DISASTERS
1
I
NTRODUCTION
Sálvano Briceño, Director, Secretariat of the International Strategy for Disaster Reduction
“