Ethiopia: Ministry holds 6th national conference on disaster risk management - highlights women and girls

"Across regions, evidence indicates strongly that sustainable development strategies that do not promote gender equality and the full participation and empowerment of women and girls will not succeed," said UNDP Country Director Alessandra Tisot at the 6th National Conference on Disaster Risk Management in Addis Ababa, as reported by Walta Information Center. Ms Tisot added that "Women and girls play catalytic roles in the social, economic and environmental progress of any nation."

The UNDP official also said that "If the lessons of the recent drought, which affected the Horn of Africa, is anything to go by, we invested more on emergency response rather than on disaster risk reduction. That money could have a better return had it been spent on drought prevention, preparedness and mitigation.”