2017•05•22     Mexico

Photo by Logan Abassi, UN-MINUSTAH

Cancún, Mexico, 22 May 2017:  At an important moment for climate politics, the Global Platform on Disaster Risk Reduction 2017 kicks off today in Cancún, Mexico. During four days, senior government officials, experts and stakeholders from public and private sector engage in dialogue about instruments and implementation of measures that can effectively reduce the risk of environmental disasters.

The outcomes of the Global Platform are expected to provide vital information for policy discussions in the UN governance bodies and mechanisms like the General Assembly, the ECOSOC and the High Level Political Forum on Sustainable Development, and especially for the follow-up processes to UN conferences and summits, in particular the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and the Sustainable Development Goals.

UNU-EHS will be represented at the event by United Nations University Vice Rector Prof Jakob Rhyner and Fabrice Renaud, Head of the Environmental Vulnerability & Ecosystem Services Section (EVES), Matthias Garschagen, Head of the Vulnerability Assessment, Risk Management and Adaptive Planning Section (VARMAP), and Jörg Szarzynski, Head of the EduSphere section. One of the institute´s priorities will be to highlight the importance of ecosystems in disaster risk reduction, which has been widely recognized in the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction but also in the context of climate change adaptation in form of the Paris Agreement and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

Together with the Partnership for Environment and Disaster Risk Reduction (PEDRR) and the Partners for Resilience (PfR), UNU-EHS will co-organize a side event on Wednesday, 24 May, 13.30hs local time, in which participants will discuss the integration of ecosystem-based solutions into disaster risk reduction, climate change adaptation and sustainable development planning.

The Global Platform for Disaster Risk Reduction, as recognized by the UN General Assembly, is the main forum at the global level for strategic advice, coordination, partnership development and the review of progress in the implementation of international instruments on disaster risk reduction. It was established in 2006 and is now the world’s foremost gathering of stakeholders committed to reducing disaster risk and building the resilience of communities and nations.