RISK Award Ceremony 2025: "Children and youths as agents of change for Disaster Risk Reduction"

Disasters don't discriminate, yet some people are more at risk! This statement is becoming increasingly true. Analyses of the numbers of victims and people affected prove: countries in the Global South are more affected than countries in the Global North, and vulnerable people, such as marginalised groups, children, young people, women, people with disabilities and more, suffer disproportionally. Data from UNDRR shows that over 1 billion children have had their lives disrupted by disasters since 2000, with more than 80,000 schools damaged or destroyed. According to UNICEF, approximately one billion children worldwide are at extremely high risk due to climate impacts, including climate-related disasters.

To address this injustice, Munich Re: Foundation and UNDRR dedicated the 2025 RISK Award to the topic of "Children and youths as agents of change for DRR". It is important to understand that children and young people are not only "victims", but also have great potential to become risk managers themselves. They can contribute to their own safety, as well as that of their families and communities, in a variety of ways. This can happen through education and raising awareness, participation in DRR planning and decision making, community engagement as well as youth advocacy, amongst other approaches. Everyone is called upon to participate in disaster risk reduction, so if you are involved in disaster risk reduction projects for and with children and young people, we invite you to attend the RISK Award ceremony and learn about the winner of 2025.

We have reviewed over 500 project submissions from around the world and our esteemed jury has selected a winner for the Award, which comes with a grant of 100,000 EUR. 

The Ceremony

The winner of the 2025 RISK Award will be officially announced at the RISK Award Ceremony by the UNDRR Assistant Secretary-General and Special Representative of the Secretary-General for Disaster Risk Reduction Mr. Kamal Kishore during the Global Platform 2025.

The ceremony will take place at GP2025 conference venue CICG in Plenary A on 4 June at 18:15-19:00. The ceremony will be followed by a reception at 19:00-20:00. The ceremony is open to all GP2025 attendees. Seats are limited. The ceremony will be broadcasted.

Agenda:

• Keynote on Youth and Children in DRR:
  Ms. Katherine SotoMayor, Executive Secretary of the Youth Network for DRR in the Americas and the Caribbean and Regional Focal Point at the UNMGCY DRR Working Group
• Insights in the 2025 RISK Award:
  Mr. Dirk Reinhard, Vice Chairman, Munich Re Foundation
• Presentation of the winning project
• UNDRR remarks:
  Mr. Kamal Kishore, Special Representative of the Secretary-General for Disaster Risk Reduction, UNDRR
• Moderator:
  Ms. Jeanette Elsworth, Chief, Communications, Advocacy, Knowledge Management and ICT, UNDRR

Live stream: