International Day for Disaster Reduction (IDDR)

The International Day for Disaster Reduction is a day to celebrate how people and communities are reducing their risk to disasters and raising awareness about the importance of DRR. It's also a day to encourage every citizen and government to take part in building more disaster resilient communities and nations. The day is celebrated on 13 October each year. 

During IDDR 2014, the focus was on older people, including their needs and what they contribute to better planning and understanding of disaster risk in their communities. IDDR 2014 sought to to switch on and amplify this critical issue then and for the post-2015 framework for disaster risk reduction. The theme for the year was "Resilience is for life."

During IDDR 2015, the goal  was to raise awareness on the use of traditional, indigenous and local knowledge and practices, to complement scientific knowledge in disaster risk management; and to highlight approaches for engaging local communities and indigenous peoples in implementation of the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction. The theme for the year was "Knowledge for Life"

In 2016 the new "Sendai Seven" campaign was launched to promote each of the seven targets of the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction. IDDR 2016 sought to create a wave of awareness about actions taken to reduce mortality around the world. The theme for the year was "Live to Tell"

Africa Working Group (AWG)

Before 2015, The Africa Working Group (AWG) on Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR) met bi-annually to take stock of the progress made regionally on the implementation of the Hyogo Framework for Action (HFA) and the Africa Regional Strategy for DRR and its Extended Programme of Action: 2006-2015. Since the adoption of the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction 2015-2030, the AWG is working towards the implementation of the framework.

The Africa Working Group on Disaster Risk Reduction (AWG) provides technical support to the African Union Commission, Regional Economic Communities, Member States and partners for coordination and implementation of the Africa Regional Strategy for Disaster Risk Reduction and its Programme of Action. The AWG meets biannually wherein the Core Group and Extended Group meet alternatively. Nine such sessions of the AWG have been convened so far.

The fifth Africa Working Group (AWG5 - extended) held in Abuja, Nigeria in May 2014 saw the Africa Position on HFA-2 adopted through a Ministerial Declaration.  

The sixth Africa Working Group (AWG6 - core) held in Arusha in October 2014 saw Africa became the first region to officially adopt its contribution to the Post-2015 DRR Framework.  The meeting provided members with the opportunity to provide input towards the 1st Preparatory Committee Meeting (PrepCom) for the Post-2015 DRR Framework where African member states were ably represented, and plan for continued African participation in the 2nd PrepCom and the World Conference on Disaster Risk Reduction in Sendai, Japan in 2015. The meeting also focused on the Extended Programme of Action for the implementation of the Africa Regional Strategy for Disaster Risk Reduction (2006-2015) and its successor arrangements.

The seventh Africa Working Group (AWG7 - extended) meeting took place in July 2015 in Yaoundé, Cameroon, following the adoption of the Sendai Framework. The overall objective was to agree on concrete follow-up actions and political commitments to ensure effective implementation of the Sendai Framework in the continent. In an effort to deliver on the Decision of the Executive Council of the AU in January 2015, the extended AWG7 meeting focused on the review of the programme of action and regional and national DRR programmes and their alignment with the Sendai Framework. The high-level meeting considered the outcome of the extended AWG7 technical meeting and adopted recommendations on concrete commitments to facilitate and support full implementation of the Sendai Framework across Africa. The political roadmap to facilitate this process was adopted through the Yaoundé Declaration, adopted by African Ministers at the 4^th High Level Meeting on Disaster Risk Reduction, also organised in Yaoundé, Cameroon in July 2015.

In February 2016 the eighth Africa Working Group (AWG 8 - core) was held in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. The meeting focused on the implementation of the Yaoundé Declaration, particularly the adopted two key action points:

• Align the Programme of Action for Implementation of the Africa Regional Strategy for Disaster Risk Reduction with the Sendai Framework
• Set up a follow-up mechanism at the highest possible level in the African Union and, in the interim period, establish a sub-committee on disaster risk reduction within the African Union Specialised Technical Committee on Agriculture, Rural Development, Water and Environment.

The ninth Africa Working Group (AWG9 - extended) was held in Livingstone, Zambia in October 2016. The objectives of the meeting were to: 

• Review progress in the implementation of the Yaoundé Declaration on the implementation of the Sendai Framework in Africa;
• Review the status of implementation of agreed action points from the 8th Session of AWG, 16-17 February 2016;
• Review and finalise the Programme of Action for implementation of the Sendai Framework in Africa;
• Agree on the structure and agenda of the Sixth Session of the Africa Regional Platform (AfRP) and Fifth High-Level meeting on Disaster Risk Reduction, 22-25 November 2016, Mauritius; and
• Review the progress in the implementation of the ACP-EU DRR Programme: Building Disaster Resilience to Natural Hazards in Sub-Saharan African Regional, Countries, and Communities

Africa Regional Platform (AfRP) & High Level Meetings

Regional Platforms for Disaster Risk Reduction are multi-stakeholder forums that were developed incrementally after the Kobe Conference 2005. While they have varying characteristics, they all share the same traits as dynamic forums for policy-makers, partners, experts and practitioners to announce initiatives, launch products, share information, promote campaigns, monitor progress and provide evidence about disaster risk reduction.

The Sendai Framework recognizes the Global and Regional Platforms for Disaster Risk Reduction as key mediums for its implementation, building on the pivotal role that they have played in supporting the implementation of the Hyogo Framework for Action.

The Africa Regional Platform is a biennial forum that brings together African Member States, intergovernmental organizations and development partners to review progress in the implementation of the continental and global disaster risk reduction frameworks. The Platform also enables the sharing of good practices and lessons learnt with a view to enhancing coordination, increasing awareness, and mobilizing commitments to disaster risk reduction across Africa. Six sessions of the Africa Regional Platform have been convened so far.

The High Level Meeting of African Ministers responsible for disaster risk reduction is responsible for agreeing and adopting the outcomes of the regional platform and Africa Working Group through a Declaration, which is later submitted to the African Union Summit for endorsement. Five sessions of the High Level Meeting have been convened so far.

Peer Reviews

Peer reviewing is an important tool to help take stock of countries’ efforts to reduce disaster risk and to share lessons among them in order to help national and international policy-making in disaster risk management. The Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction identifies strengthening disaster risk governance to manage disaster risk as a key priority for action.

Malawi has undergone a peer review of its policies and actions during a ten-day assessment, by three specialists each from Mozambique, South Africa and Zimbabwe. Africa’s first-ever peer review report on disaster risk reduction is currently under development.

Stakeholder Mobilization

There has been increased participation of different stakeholder groups in disaster risk reduction initiatives and activities. Parliamentarians have come together in support of disaster risk reduction, at the national level (Kenya and Uganda) and regional level (East and Central Africa).

65% of Africa’s population constitutes of youth. Failure to tap into their energy and meaningfully engage with them will render the conversation and action around disaster risk reduction incomplete. A network of youth delegates has been formed to promote disaster risk reduction – the Programme of Action for the Implementation of Sendai Framework, highlights youth participation and leadership as important roles. In January 2015, the Africa Resilient Youth group  was formed and signed a declaration to highlight their commitment to create awareness and reduce disaster risks at the local, national and regional levels through: social media campaigns encouraging their various local governments to sign up and participate in the UNDRR-led Making Cities Resilient Campaign; and collaboration to strengthen the Africa disaster risk reduction Youth Champions Network. 

The media have networked to form the Disaster Risk Reduction Network of Africa Journalists (DIRAJ) an organization that seeks to:

• Encourage and support the professional growth of members with a passion to entrench DRR in the development agenda
• Act as a medium of education and support for members and a resource Centre for policy makers and the public
• Represent members and the DRR community to policy makers

DIRAJ members have continuously told the DRR story through coverage of events and publishing of news stories. They have also conducted media trainings in partnership with UNDRR to better equip media in their coverage of disasters, and help move coverage from informing and raising awareness  during disasters to advocating for a culture of disaster risk reduction  as a civic duty, government responsibility, national, regional and local obligation and a good story.

 All the stakeholder groups conducted consultations and developed respective positions to support implementation of the Sendai Framework at the 6^th Africa Regional Platform.

Regional Economic Communities play a pivotal role for regional integration in Africa and have spearheaded many initiatives to further integrate sub-regional policies and capacity building initiatives for risk reduction, response and recovery planning.

• ECCAS launched a high-level policy forum with the creation of the Central Africa. Parliamentarians Network for Natural Disasters Resilience in October 2015 in Kinshasa, DR Congo. Following that, the Second Central Africa Ministerial Conference for Disaster Risk Management, also held in Kinshasa, prepared and released The Kinshasa Declaration on the implementation of the Sendai Framework in Central Africa.
• ECOWAS consulted its member states and regional stakeholders in November 2015 in Lome, Togo on the ECOWAS DRR Plan of Action 2015-2030 to align it with the SFDRR. In October 2016 the final draft was validated and adopted in Accra, Ghana.
• SADC formulated a comprehensive work program for 2016 and 2017 supporting the regional parliamentarian DRR network. It will focus on the coordination of the El Niño response in Southern Africa and bringing forward a regional support program on recovery planning.

As of June 2016, a total of 187 persons have received training and been invited to a conference , within which 27 were women and 33 were CSOs representatives.

• Tailor knowledge creation and share events to different audiences.
• Increase capacities of Regional Economic communities to undertake risk identification and assessment
• Strengthen regional economic communities' post-disaster response co-ordination and recovery planning

Disseminate contributions of regional stakeholders in support of national early warning systems using a multi-hazard approach

• Strengthen inter-institutional mechanisms
• Ensure information sharing of forecasting information and warning dissemination
• Raise awareness on importance of early warning systems

Build a knowledge base on disaster risk management

• Produce analytical and technical products
• Establish knowledge hubs to disseminate disaster risk management knowledge
• Promote exchanges, study tours and south-south cooperation and strengthen disaster risk management networks

Enhancing risk information through the implementation of national disaster loss databases.

Having a disaster loss accounting system helps countries and communities to build resilience based on reliable, nationally-sustained information that helps to take future risk-informed decisions for preventing and reducing disaster risk. Targets 1 - 4 of the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction specifically point to the reduction of human, physical and economic disaster damages and losses as a crucial requirement for the achievement the Framework,.

Activities aimed at strengthening capacities for national and regional loss accounting are ongoing across the continent. These activities consist of:

• National and Regional workshops: representatives of selected government agencies, UN and scientific and technical partners, convene for a workshop in which they are familiarized with the methodology and tools for building national disaster loss databases.
• Data collection and entry: country national teams identify data sources (including government, media and other databases), collect historical disaster data covering a thirty (30) year period and enter the data into the database, with technical assistance from UNDRR.

• Data validation and cleaning:  the database is thoroughly checked for inconsistencies and errors in order to provide an accurate and reliable source of disaster data.

• Using disaster loss data through DesInventar open-source software: Enabling risk-informed planning, policy and decision-making through familiarizing partners with DesInventar, a disaster loss database that collects data in a standardized and rigorous way. The software allows users to display, organize and extract data, thus facilitating its analysis. 

Over 400 national staff have been trained in disaster loss accounting through 3 sub-regional and 6 national workshops. As a result a total of 19 African countries have developed national disaster loss databases.

Countries are being supported to conduct an analytical assessment of catastrophic risk to construct ‘hybrid loss exceedance curves’ that estimate the cost of the full spectrum of risk the country faces. This crucial piece of analytical information will help countries design an optimal portfolio of risk-sensitive investments.

Efforts have also been made to support integration of disaster and climate risk information. With support from the Programme, regional weather forecasts in the Greater Horn of Africa are supported and integrated with disaster risk information for effective early warning and resilience programming.

Development of disaster risk profiles and the use of risk information

UNDRR-Africa has partnerships with technical-scientific partners engaged in DRR. From 2018-19 it worked with the CIMA Research Foundation and national disaster risk management authorities in 16 Sub-Saharan African countries to develop country-level disaster risk profiles. The risk profiles provide a comprehensive view of hazard, risk and uncertainties for floods and droughts in a changing climate and for a socio-economic situation, projected over the next 50 years. The risk profiles include an estimation, under current and future climate, of the monetary losses for different sectors identified by the Sendai targets, namely: housing, health and education, agriculture, productive asset, critical infrastructure, housing, services and transports. Metrics employed in the risk profiles include the Average Annual Loss (AAL) and Probable Maximal Loss (PML). In 2019, additional metrics were included for drought risk, reflecting a need to increase quantitative assessment for food security. Results of the risk profiles, in the form of detailed graphic reports and data layers (estimated losses, exposure), are available on a Geonode portal in a format readily available to view and to plug into other analyses of risk.

UNDRR’s risk profiling approach includes national workshops to critically examine the risk profiling methodology and sessions focus on the use of risk information across the different sectors of DRR. UNDRR’s approach to the development and used of risk information aims to empower the national coordination mechanisms for DRR such as the national platforms for DRR and to inform stakeholders involved in the development and implementation of strategic DRR documents and policies.

[1] Angola, Botswana, Cameroon, Côte d’Ivoire, Equatorial Guinea, Eswatini (The Kingdom of), Ethiopia, Gabon, Gambia (The), Ghana, Guinea-Bissau, Kenya, Malawi, Namibia, São Tomé and Príncipe, Tanzania (United Republic of) and Zambia