Study Guide
Disaster Risk Reduction
By UNDP Dais
The 4th Hong Kong Baptist University Model United Nations Conference
Nov.1.
30 - Dec. 1, 2013
Table of Contents
Abstract ........................................................................................................................................... 1
Introduction to United Nations Development Program ................................................................. 1
Introduction to Disaster Risk Reduction ......................................................................................... 2
Past Actions ..................................................................................................................................... 3
Yokohama Strategy and Plan of Action for a Safer World .......................................................... 3
International Strategy for Disaster Reduction ............................................................................ 3
United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction ..................................................................... 4
Hyogo Framework for Action ...................................................................................................... 4
General Assembly Resolutions .................................................................................................... 5
Annual Reports of the Secretary-General ................................................................................... 5
Critiques .......................................................................................................................................... 6
Questions a Resolution Must Answer ............................................................................................. 7
Reference and Recommend Reading.............................................................................................. 8
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Abstract
Disaster, either classified as natural or man-made, has been a vital issue since the
emergence of human beings. Pointed out by the United Nations Office for Disaster Risk
Reduction, disasters not only physically disrupt the functioning of a community or
society, but also brings huge damage to the economy.
The Indian Ocean Tsunami in 2004 took around 230,000 lives. The Tōhoku earthquake
and tsunami together with subsequent Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster has been
noted as one of the costliest natural disasters in history by the World Bank. Damages
associated with Hurricane Sandy in the United States of America, Canada and across the
Caribbean exceeded $65 billion. Extensive flooding in parts of South-West and NorthEast China in 2013 resulted in overall losses in excess of $8 billion. These losses put
more burdens on countries on top of the economic crisis.
Although most disasters are natural phenomena, human beings’ behavior also directly
or indirectly contribute to the increase of quantity and intensity of disasters. For
instance, climate change is believed to contribute occurrence of disaster in recent years.
Corruption that hampers rehabilitation should also be condemned.
As identified by the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies,
both vulnerability and disasters have increased in this decade. Though major directions
have been identified and several consensuses have been reached, many aspects such as
the details of implementation, evaluation, and integrated prevention and mitigation
system have to be further elaborated.
Introduction to United Nations Development
Program
Officially founded in 1966, the United Nations Development
Program (UNDP) is in nature an executive board under UN
General Assembly. Operating in 177 countries, it “partners with
people at all levels of society to help build nations that can
withstand crisis, and drive and sustain the kind of growth that
improves the quality of life for everyone”1.
Crisis prevention and recovery is one of UNDP’s four main
working areas, by which it helps countries to prevent both human
1
United Nations Development Program: Overview
http://www.undp.org/content/undp/en/home/ourwork/overview/
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conflict and natural disasters, and to alleviate the outcome of these hazards by
providing humanitarian assistance, reinforcing governance, supporting livelihoods,
establish short-term employment schemes for local people and more. Guided by the
ideology that "natural disaster as a cause and product of failed development”2, UNDP
urges development as a priority in disaster risk reduction.
Under its classification of focusing areas, the term “disaster risk reduction and climate
risk management” reflects its concern on the impact of disaster risk associated with
climate change. UNDP correspondingly runs the “Climate Risk Management – Technical
Assistance Support Project” to study the short-term impact climate change brings in 17
countries. So far most results show that climate change has negative impact on humans.
Introduction to Disaster Risk Reduction
Defined by United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction, disaster is “a serious
disruption of the functioning of a community or a society involving widespread human,
material, economic or environmental losses and impacts, which exceeds the ability of
the affected community or society to cope using its own resources.” 3
In common sense, disasters, especially natural disasters, are hardly evitable. But
contemporary scholars tend to believe there are no such things called “natural
disasters”. By introducing the word vulnerability, they argue that it is when certain
natural hazards meets specific vulnerability that a disaster happens. In other words,
they virtually mean that by applying proper risk management measures, human can
prevent a disaster by reducing the corresponding vulnerability to minimum, or at least
make people more resilient to it.
It is foreseeable that enormous losses could have been avoided and countless life could
have been saved, if an alert were issued minutes before the 2004 Indian Ocean Tsunami
arrive, if the buildings were faithfully constructed before the 2008 Sichuan Earthquake,
if the nuclear reactors were property designed and protected in the 2011 Tōhoku
earthquake and tsunami. It is a must that humans learn lesson from these cases and get
well prepared, because there are always chance for the same things to happen as long
as we deal with nature.
2
United Nations Development Program, Reducing Disaster Risk: A Challenge for Development
http://www.undp.org/content/dam/undp/library/crisis%20prevention/disaster/asia_pacific/Reducing%20
Disaster%20risk%20a%20Challenge%20for%20development.pdf
3
http://www.unisdr.org/we/inform/terminology
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To highlight humans’ positive role when facing disasters, disaster risk deduction should
be seen as the systematic attempt to identify causing factors, manage and decrease
vulnerability, enhance preparedness and thus make people more resilient to disaster,
rather than negative defense.
Past Actions
The international community has paid much effort in combating disaster but early
actions focused more on mitigation by providing humanitarian assistance, technological
support and economic aid. The concept of risk reduction was not clearly mentioned until
after 1990s and then spread fast especially after the happening of several severe
disasters in this century. Some of the most famous actions are listed below:
Yokohama Strategy and Plan of Action for a Safer World
The Yokohama Strategy and Plan of Action for a Safer World was issued on World
Conference on Natural Disaster Reduction in 1994. As one of the earliest documents in
disaster risk reduction area, it positioned itself as guidelines for natural disaster
prevention, preparedness and mitigation. Among other documents, it emphasized more
on hazards in less developed countries by identifying their higher vulnerability. It was
also the first time a plan describing comprehensive activities at national, regional and
international levels.
International Strategy for Disaster Reduction
The International Strategy for Disaster Reduction was created in 1999 by General
Assembly’s resolution 54/219 based on the experience accumulated from the
International Decade for Natural Disaster Reduction (1990-1999). Guided by the vision
“to enable all communities to become resilient to the effects of natural, technological
and environmental hazards, reducing the
compound risks they pose to social and
economic vulnerabilities within modern
societies”, it initiated plenty of goals and
objectives to accomplish and also set
governments and local communities as
responsible bodies to participate both
region and international collaboration
under the leadership of UN.
The release of the strategy is the milestone indicating the conceptual shift from disaster
mitigation to prevention.
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United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction
To oversee the implementation of International Strategy for Disaster Reduction, UN
established the United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction (UNISDR) in the
subsequent year. Today, the function and contribution of the Office has surpassed the
Strategy itself and its guidance of work has included Millennium Development Goals
(MDGs) and the consideration of the effect of climate change.
As a focal point in the UN
system for collaboration, the
Office helps implement Hyogo
Framework for Action, advocate
various campaigns, and educate
the public. More importantly, it
helps establish cooperation platforms in different levels, which exchange information in
the meeting on a regular basis. Its Annual reports are considered of high reference value
to the UN and other organizations. Furthermore, the office is requested by General
Assembly to facilitate the "Post-2015 Frame work for Disaster Risk Reduction” which is
expected to be released in the World Conference on Disaster Reduction in March 2015.
It is one of the most important organizations in disaster risk reduction area in the world.
Hyogo Framework for Action
The Hyogo Declaration and the paring Hyogo Framework for Action (HFA) were the
outcome of the UN’s World Conference on Disaster Reduction in 2005, one year after
the deadly India Tsunami happened. It was the first time that international community
came up with a comprehensive framework in disaster risk reduction, in which it not only
stated specific goals to accomplish from 2005 to 2015, but also came up with five
priorities for action. They are:
1. Ensure that disaster risk reduction is a national and a local priority
with a strong institutional basis for implementation;
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.
It also reaffirmed duties for UN member states and other organizations to bear and
specially requested all partners in the International Strategy for Disaster Reduction to
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support the action of Inter-Agency Task Force, making it almost binding to ensure their
active roles in this area.
General Assembly Resolutions
Generally Assembly (GA) has paying its attention to disaster risk reduction for a long
time. The relevant resolution it issued are generally classified into three categories
considering their agendas.
The first type of resolution considers the implementation of International Strategy for
Disaster Reduction. This type of resolutions was released every year since 1999, in
which it reaffirmed its attitude in tackling the issue, summarized current progress and
requested the Secretary-General to submit the Annual Report.
The second type of resolutions focused on natural disasters and vulnerability. Among
them, the increasing vulnerability and low resilience in developing countries, State’s
responsibility in setting disaster risk reduction as priority, and implementation of HFA
are paid special attention.
The last type of resolutions put more concern on international cooperation to reduce
the impact of El Niño phenomenon. The phenomenon, which is characterized by
abnormally warm ocean water in western coast of South America, is believed to be
associated with extreme weathers around the world. By issuing these resolutions, UN
oversees its observation and study to the phenomenon.
Annual Reports of the Secretary-General
The Reports, as their name indicates, are submitted every year by the Secretary-General
of UN since 2001. With a full name called “implementation of the International Strategy
for Disaster Reduction: Report of Secretary-General”, they forecasted the trends in
disasters and their risks, summarized progress made on the International Strategy for
Disaster Reduction of that year, gave recommendations and requirement to different
part of the world, and always called for increasing investments in this area.
As identified by the Annual Report in 2013, economic losses will be double by 2030 due
to the lack of consideration of disaster risks. It warned that as a result of arbitrary
investment decision, disasters could be out of control in many countries in the world
and thus would hamper their sustainable development. It urged cooperation among
different levels in various forms. It also placed high expectation on the 3rd United
Nations World Conference on Disaster Reduction in March 2015, which is supposed to
come up with a successive plan of the current HFA.
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Critiques
In terms of setting disaster risk reduction as a national priority, some scholars point out
that the HFA is too ideal and optimistic because the quantity of investment is always
limited. For some least developed countries, there may be other urgent issues to solve.
They are convinced that the typical idea of solving the “disaster-hazard-vulnerabilitydisaster” circle by promoting investment exclusively on prevention has its natural flaw.
Furthermore, instead of urging that
development can benefit human by
increasing resilience, some voices take
notes that it is just because all the
irrational development, that increases
vulnerability and makes humans suffer
more from disaster.
There are many examples of the drive for
economic growth and social improvement
generating new disaster risks. Rapid
urbanization is an example, in which the
growth of informal settlements and inner
city slums has led to the growth of
unstable living environments. Another
example is the utilization of nuclear power
to generate electricity as a substitute for
traditional thermal power plants. At the first glance, it is seen as almost a clean energy
with no pollution to the atmosphere, but Fukushima and Chernobyl have reminded us
what kind of damage it can cause and how hard it is to heal. 20 years after the ideology
“Development is of overriding importance”4 dominated China and triggered exclusive
concentration on economic growth, various severe pollution has become a nightmare
that is so long for China to see the sign of waking up.
All these critiques need to be studies and answered properly if the international
community wants to make further progress in this area.
4
By former President Xiaoping Deng in 1992
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Questions a Resolution Must Answer
Positioning itself as a preparatory
meeting for the 3rd World Conference
on Disaster Reduction in March 2015
with the objective of initializing "Post2015 Framework for Disaster Risk
Reduction”, the resolution of this
committee must answer the following
questions:
1. What should UNDP do more in disaster risk reduction?
2. In terms of various possible development forms (utility, education, forecast,
mitigation etc.), are there any priorities giving limited budget? Why?
3. How to deal with country differences in selecting appropriate actions?
4. What are the gaps in purpose, guidance, support and capacity of the cooperation
platforms? How to solve them?
5. What is UNDP’s response to the critiques mentioned above?
6. Despite all the points mentioned in HFA, what else should be promoted in the World
Conference on Disaster Reduction in March 2015?
7. What should be emphasized in the potential “Post-2015 Frame work for Disaster
Risk Reduction”?
All the draft resolutions which fail to address the above points will not be approved by
the dais and thus cannot be introduced to the committee.
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Reference and Recommend Reading
United Nations Development Program, Overview
http://www.undp.org/content/undp/en/home/ourwork/overview.html
United Nations Development Program, Reducing Disaster Risk: A Challenge for
Development
http://www.undp.org/content/dam/undp/library/crisis%20prevention/disaster/asia_pa
cific/Reducing%20Disaster%20risk%20a%20Challenge%20for%20development.pdf
National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), The Impact of Climate Change
on Natural Disasters
http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Features/RisingCost/rising_cost5.php
United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction, Terminology on Disaster Risk
Reduction
http://www.unisdr.org/files/7817_UNISDRTerminologyEnglish.pdf
United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction, UN Resolutions and Reports
http://www.unisdr.org/we/inform/resolutions-reports#gaelnino
Yokohama Strategy and Plan of Action for a Safer World - Guidelines for Natural Disaster
Prevention, Preparedness and Mitigation
http://www.ifrc.org/Docs/idrl/I248EN.pdf
International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, Disaster Risk
Reduction: a Global Advocacy Guide
http://www.ifrc.org/Global/Publications/disasters/reducing_risks/DRR-advocacyguide.pdf
McEntire D.A., Sustainability or invulnerable development? Australian Journal of
Emergency Management, 58
http://www.em.gov.au/Documents/Sustainability_or_invulnerable_development.pdf
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, Managing the Risks of Extreme Events and
Disasters to Advance Climate Change Adaptation
https://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/special-reports/srex/SREX_Full_Report.pdf
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