This Sunday, the 13th of October, is the 30th International Day for Disaster Risk Reduction (IDDRR). An initiative started by the UN General Assembly in 1989 in order to promote a global culture of disaster risk reduction. This year the theme is ‘Build to Last’.
Several years ago, we identified flood forecasts as a unique opportunity to improve people’s lives, and began looking into how Google’s infrastructure and machine learning expertise can help in this field. Last year, we started our flood forecasting pilot in the Patna region, and since then we have expanded our flood forecasting coverage, as part […]
Finding positive takeaways from a catastrophe loss can be tough, but analyzing how a natural event became a humanitarian disaster can help communities build resilience against future catastrophes.
On September 23rd, world leaders will answer UN Secretary-General António Guterres’ call to come to UN headquarters for a Climate Action Summit with “concrete, realistic plans” to fight the climate emergency. The Summit will provide a platform for governments, the private sector, civil society, local authorities and other international organizations to develop ambitious solutions and […]
Floods affect more people around the world than any other hazard. This blog explains why we need to acknowledge the vital role resilience against floods and other hazards play in countries’ abilities to reach the Sustainable Development Goals.
This blog captures the key recommendations for the UN Climate Action Summit from Zurich Flood Resilience Alliance’s session on the importance of systems thinking in building inclusive climate resilience at the Asia Pacific Climate Week in September 2019.
On September 1, 2019 destructive winds and storm surge from Hurricane Dorian devastated the Bahamas. In the days that followed, the storm weakened but expanded in size as it moved northward up the Atlantic coast of the United States. Climate change is intensifying the impacts of hurricanes like Harvey and Irma in 2017, Florence in […]
On May 3, 2019 Cyclone Fani made landfall on the east coast of India, devastating homes and livelihoods. The road of recovery will be a challenging one. However, thanks to effective early warning systems and evacuation protocols established following Cyclone Odisha in 1999, loss of life was minimal. These successes illustrate the value of learning […]
Though marginalised gender groups are more vulnerable to the risks of disasters their experiences are rarely included in research. Practical Action has pioneered new approaches to include and highlight these missing voices while researching flood early warning systems in Nepal and Peru.
