Learn more about Integrating Indigenous knowledge in building disaster resilience and usefulness of the Global Research Initiative and Knowledge Repository concept called IKRI- Indigenous Knowledge Research Infrastructure, a tool for Sendai Framework implementation. 

Where do we stand

While the Indigenous knowledge-IK is vital for DRR covering land, oceans, ecosystems, and societal transitions, there are challenges and barriers for Indigenous communities to implement workable and replicable solutions in pursuit of building disaster and climate resilience.  

1. IK is widely scattered, at times, exists in small pockets; much of the IK is transferred through practices and not well-documents.  
2. There is an urgent need of capturing, preserving, and nurturing the DRR system-specific components of IK  
3. Need to derive simplified knowledge products that are outcome of research to create baselines and targets for Indigenous communities.  
4. Need to strengthen technical capacity of indigenous communities to consolidate existing knowledge that may be useful to assess disaster risks, vulnerabilities, and exposure to all hazards. 
5. Need to empower Indigenous youths to use integrated technologies driven DRR solutions to address the challenges with accelerated technological inequalities amongst the Indigenous Peoples. 

Session guiding questions

1. What are the challenges for integrating Indigenous knowledge with emerging technology-based solutions for implementation of Sendai Framework? 
2. What are the requirements of key stakeholders those interested in indigenous knowledge related to SFDRR, and how these can be incorporated into IKRI? 
3. How to tap into existing scattered data from the public/private domain for IKRI? 
4. How to develop and test IKRI prototype to make a robust infrastructure to support SFDRR? 

Where do we stand

Regional organisations play a critical role in disaster risk reduction and humanitarian response, including as the custodian of regional mechanism that enable members to share and combine resources in support of disaster affected countries.
Despite this common role played by regional organisations, to date there has been no comprehensive overview of the various mechanisms employed by different regional organisations, and therefore there has been little opportunity to learn from each other to strengthen the systems that do exist. This session will also provide an opportunity for international organisations and non-governmental organisations, with their own similar standby mechanisms, to understand how they can work with the existing structures and systems in different regions, and build interoperability between the systems where possible. 

Session guiding questions

• What are the processes and mechanisms applied by regional humanitarian organisations to mobilise resources in support of disaster affected countries; what resources can be mobilised, when to mobilise and how to mobilise them? 
• What are the experiences and challenges in mobilising resources in support of disaster affected countries? 
• How is the current status of interoperability between international stand-by arrangement and regional stand-by arrangement mechanisms?  
• What collaboration can be done between regional organisations and humanitarian partners to enhance disaster preparedness and response?

Where do we stand  

Many of the world’s disasters are predictable, and the science used to forecast them is increasingly reliable, enabling actors to put in place the actions and financing required to act before a disaster hits. Early actions include, for instance, providing populations at risk with cash, sanitation and hygiene kits and shelter toolkits ahead of the predicted shock. Triggers are the risk-informed forecast-based thresholds for a particular hazard that will release the pre-agreed financing and set the actions underway.
Anticipatory action approaches are now being implemented in over 60 countries by the Red Cross Red Crescent (RCRC) Network, Start Network, the WFP, FAO, OCHA and others. There is growing evidence, investment and political commitment for scaling up and mainstreaming into national Disaster Risk Management systems. Anticipatory action can address disaster risk and climate change, bridging humanitarian and development agendas. It supports the achievement of the Sendai Framework Target G to substantially increase the availability of and access to multi‑hazard early warning systems and disaster risk information and assessments to the people by 2030. 
Anticipatory action aims to be locally led and empower local actors, but there is a growing need to further engage communities and local actors to build stronger collaboration between humanitarian actors, governments, scientific partners and others to ensure we are meeting their needs and continuously learning.
The mission of the Anticipation Hub is to facilitate knowledge exchange, learning, guidance and advocacy for practitioners, scientists and policymakers that supports them to jointly work with at-risk communities to collectively achieve anticipatory action. To do so, it brings together 90+ partners across the RCRC Movement, universities, research institutes, (i)NGOs, UN agencies, governments, donors, and network initiatives.

Session guiding questions

1. What are the practical benefits of anticipatory action as experienced by at-risk communities? 
2. What are the different components of anticipatory action and how do they connect with Disaster Risk Reduction and Early Warning Systems?  
3. Who needs to collaborate to ensure that anticipatory action initiatives are engaging with, and meeting the needs of communities?   
4. What is the Anticipation Hub and how can it help to facilitate knowledge exchange, learning, guidance and advocacy to meet end-user needs? 

This session gathers ARISE members to exchange views, experiences and knowledge based on an all-of-society approach.

Where do we stand

Private sector companies, both large and small, recognize the growing importance of disaster risk reduction (on macroeconomic stability, value chains, etc.). Nevertheless, the private sector is not alone in this task. As the Sendai Framework established, the “commitment, goodwill, knowledge, experience and resources” from all stakeholders including academia, media, and other sectors in civil society at the local, national, regional and global levels are needed.

Session guiding questions

1. How does the private sector and ARISE contribute to DRR?
2. How to enhance collective engagement in DRR?

Expected Outcomes

• Enhanced knowledge and understanding about SEM and its work in contributing to an all of society approach in building disaster resilience.
• Enhanced knowledge on lessons learned in implementing the Sendai Framework, from a stakeholder perspective.

Session guiding questions

•  Do you have any suggestions of additions or adaptations of the SEM Action Plan 2022-23?
• What do you think the key priorities are in terms of SEM’s Action Plan2022-23 activities?
• Do you have a good understanding of what the SEM is?
• What initiatives can be undertaken to increase SEM’s actions and impact as well as visibility and awareness?

Read this section to ensure you come prepared for this special session. 

Where do we stand

Up to 3.6 billion people, or around 40% of the world's population, are highly vulnerable to the impacts of climate change… and that multiple climate hazards will occur simultaneously, and multiple climatic and non-climatic risks will interact, resulting in compounding risk and risks cascading across sectors and regions – these were among the headline messages from Working Group II of the 6th Assessment Report of the IPCC. The report further warns that a continued warming planet imposes limits to adaptation, while risk-blind planning is resulting in increased risk and maladaptation. 

The Glasgow Climate Pact, agreed at the COP 26, emphasizes the urgency of scaling up action and support to strengthen resilience and reduce vulnerability to climate change, including through enhanced finance, capacity- building and technology transfer. Through outlining the functions of the Santiago Network, it recognizes the importance of demand-driven technical assistance in building capacity to implement approaches to reduce the adverse effects of climate change. The Pact offers glimpses of hope though it is acknowledged that the ambition needs to be much higher. 

The COP 26 also laid the foundation for the Global Goal on Adaptation (GGA) through the Glasgow-Sharm el-Sheikh Work Programme on the Global Goal on Adaptation. The Work Programme is expected to follow a bottom-up approach whereby the aspirations of local communities are brought to the fore and aggregated upwards to define what constitutes resilience in the face of different hazards – floods, droughts, storms, extreme temperatures and sea-level rise. The perspective of stakeholder experience at the last mile underscores the importance of including affected populations in the assessment of collective progress towards achieving the GGA.   This approach is consistent with the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction which emphasizes a people-centric, multi-stakeholder approach to resilience-building.    

Further, the Global Stocktake of the Paris Agreement (GST) will also review the overall progress made in achieving the GGA1. This will happen concurrently with the Mid-Term Review of the Sendai Framework (MTR-SF), allowing for joint reflection on how to take forward collective efforts to build resilience to growing climate and disaster risks.  

Thus, the 2022 Global Platform for Disaster Risk Reduction provides a unique opportunity, in the run up to the COP 27 to convene DRR and CCA representatives to identify ways to scale up joint action to reduce disaster risks and build resilience in the climate emergency. The special event will lead to forward-looking and foresight-driven inputs to into the GGA and the MTR-SF, and also identify high-priority recommendations to drive global efforts to urgently confront the climate emergency.  

Where do we stand

Many urban areas are becoming hotspots of disasters due to population growth, increasing and unplanned urbanization, environmental challenges including climate change, biodiversity loss and pollution, and other anthropogenic pressures. Since asset concentration and resource utilization are higher in cities, the disruption of critical infrastructure and essential services after a disaster can cripple the functioning of society and derail prospects for achieving the Sustainable Development Goals.

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change indicates that the key global climate change-related risks are concentrated in urban areas. Climate change is expected to exacerbate urban risks due to exposure to hazards, socio-economic vulnerabilities, and poor governance, among others. However, cities have the unique ability to respond to disasters, climate changes and environmental stresses at a local, more tangible level with dynamism, scale, stronger linkages and partnerships, and a greater sense of urgency among citizens and local authorities. From this perspective, the co-benefits of climate mitigation and adaptation actions are largest in cities, including increasing preparedness for recovery.

Emergency response and the international humanitarian community are not prepared to deal with urban emergencies. Urban areas need a holistic approach to resilient recovery and reconstruction. Sectoral responses are not enough in a system of systems setting as are cities.  

The critical role of population size, density and urban form has been highlighted in the COVID-19 recovery. Recognizing the city as a system of systems, cities are also now rethinking how to better address interdependencies, cascading, compounding and systemic risks, urban-rural connectivity, and transdisciplinary and multi-scale governance, among others, in an integrated manner. The biggest opportunity for urban areas from the pandemic is to build back better with the planned fiscal stimulus as the seeds of transformation toward resilient, green, more inclusive, equitable, and sustainable recovery. 

Session guiding questions

• To what extent are cities building back better in recovery from disasters? What are the main setbacks and opportunities?
• How has systems thinking been effectively applied to recovery in urban settings? 
• How many of the recovery decisions are data and evidence driven? What's the role of quality information in recovery decision making?
• How can cities adapt to the changing risk environment and recover better from COVID-19 and future disasters?
• What are some recent and emerging innovations at the local level that can be scaled up in other contexts?
• How are cities leveraging urban planning and policy to build back better, more sustainable and resilient communities?

Where do we stand

Pre-disaster recovery planning offers solutions that can mitigate challenges toward better, faster, and more equitable recovery outcomes. PDRP can help affected communities to build back stronger. Integration of disaster risk reduction measures and resilient designs into recovery is facilitated by, among other things careful planning, standards-setting, public-private partnerships and pre-arranged agreements. It depends on pre-event baseline data and protocols for timely and accurate post-event data collection to inform decision making. In the absence of preparedness, build back better measures can be cut short and quality may be compromised for the urgency of recovery.  

Pre-disaster recovery planning can help affected communities to build back faster. Pre-disaster recovery plans identify recovery stakeholders, their roles and responsibilities, and set up mechanisms for interagency multi-sectoral coordination. They can identify necessary recovery capacities and training needs. They can establish recovery governance measures, institutions and relationships, policies, and triggers that can snap into action when an event occurs. Pre-disaster recovery plans can also identify funding sources and arrange for available funds when needs arise. These types of measures expedite recovery and reduce losses from delays. 

Preparedness measures can help to build back more inclusively and equitably. The PDRP process gives an opportunity to ensure inclusive planning. It gives time to engage and understand communities, vulnerabilities and needs, and a vision for how communities should recover in ways that are consistent with their values. It allows communities to prepare for disruption and for recovery, and for their governments to establish mechanisms to meet their needs in recovery. 

Session guiding questions

• What progress has been made in recovery preparedness and planning?
• What are the major obstacles and enabling conditions for implementing and scaling up PDRP? How could community leaders and practitioners be supported with pre-disaster recovery planning?
• What ex ante recovery measures have been shown to be effective in achieving better recovery outcomes?
• What innovative approaches are emerging to improve recovery readiness?
• How can communities and other stakeholders be meaningfully engaged to ensure inclusive planning?

Where do we stand

Evidence shows that existing infrastructure systems are increasingly being affected by natural and man-made hazards, and from the impacts of climate change. According to reports, infrastructure disruptions impose costs between $391 billion and $647 billion a year in low and middle-income countries. Investing in disaster risk reduction is thus a precondition for developing sustainably in a changing climate. 

However, today’s reality is that disaster recovery too often is unplanned, and underfinanced. Preparedness to build back better remains limited and is usually addressed only as a post-disaster consideration. Given the growing frequency and intensity of disasters driven by climate change, more needs to be done to allocate necessary resources and develop capacity for recovery actions that build resilience and reduces risk across sectors. 

Improved data collection on loss and damage to infrastructure and related services through the Sendai Framework Target D and the Damage, Loss and Needs Assessment mechanisms could support planning, decision-making and investments. That said, a recent analysis by UNDRR and UNDP of 57 PDNA processes under the DaLA methodology, conducted worldwide over the last decade, has shown that service disruptions are estimated on a lower ratio when compared to physical damages, thus missing the opportunity to gain comprehensive understanding of mid- and long-term impacts of disasters on infrastructure systems and the communities that depend on them.

Session guiding questions

• How can recovery strategies be used to strengthen resilience of key infrastructure sectors?
• How can we ensure that recovery of infrastructure is planned in such a way so as to ensure resilience against future disasters?
• How can data collection and reporting on infrastructure losses and damages, and service disruptions, at the local, national and regional levels be improved?
• What are some options for financing resilience in infrastructure recovery? How do we integrate resilience in the current COVID-19 recovery and stimulus packages?