Update

In a report by the Sydney Morning Herald, State Treasurer Andrew Fraser said that it is unlikely that Queensland will find affordable natural hazard insurance for its infrastructure, but will 'jump through hoops' anyway to meet the requirements of the flood levy...

The strengthening of UNICEF's work in disaster risk reduction is part of a wider organizational effort to promote a new thrust of humanitarian action. This includes a set of principles, approaches and specific interventions that cover preparedness, response and early recovery from disaster, and thus bridge the gap between development and humanitarian programming...

'Without effective disaster prevention, hundreds of lives, thousands of homes, billions worth of properties and livelihoods, even government's growth and revenue targets, specifically our development goals, can be at the mercy of a single extreme weather event,' said Senator Loren Legarda in a PIA report...

Students from the ‘Marta Abreu’ Central University of Las Villas, won the first prize of the International Student Competition on Architecture for Disaster Reduction, reports the Cuban News Agency. Their work, was based on a study carried out in the village in the north of Villa Clara frequently hit by hurricanes and tropical storms...

'We should not balance our books at the expense of the most wretched people on the planet, especially when comparatively small amounts of money can save many lives in the developing world', says an opinion piece in The Independent, referring to the recent DFID report published earlier this week...

Cities are invisible in the UK Department for International Development (DFID) review of UK aid. Yet only a year ago DFID were calling cities 'The New Frontier' in a high profile document that proclaimed 'Cities are the future of the twenty first century', writes Cliff Hague...

Dr K M Nabiul Islam Senior Research Fellow, BIDS, and Study Director, BME Study, Small Scale Water Resources Project, in the first of his two-part article explores the many facets of water management and climate change adaptation in Bangladesh...

'It is important to take urgent steps in mainstreaming adaptation, mitigation and capacity building into national level planning and budgeting processes', writes Dr KM Nabiul Islam in the conclusion of his two-part article in the Financial Express...

'Now is the time to build up Pakistan's resilience to disaster' said Neva Khan, director of NGO Oxfam in Pakistan. 'The cost of implementing safeguards pales in comparison to the damage to lives and property [that could be caused by the monsoon]'...

'Existing local mechanisms for managing risks should be identified and strengthened and efforts targeted at developing economic resilience should be integrated with overall disaster risk management' said the minister of State in the Prime Minister's Office, Mr William Lukuvi, reports the Citizen...