IPU hears call to support women in DRR

Source(s): United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction
Gender equality was an important theme at this week's IPU General Assembly in Geneva. (Photo: UNISDR)
Gender equality was an important theme at this week's IPU General Assembly in Geneva. (Photo: UNISDR)

GENEVA, 16 October 2014 – The vital role that women play in reducing disaster risk is being increasingly recognized, Members of Parliament from 141 countries have been told at a major international forum of legislators.

The Special Representative of the Secretary-General for Disaster Risk Reduction, Ms Margareta Wahlström, in a message to the Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU) said that consistent advocacy over the 10-year lifetime of the Hyogo Framework for Action had made progress but more needed to be done.

Ms Wahlström, urged more than 700 MPs – including 104 Speakers and Deputy Speakers of parliament – at the IPU’s 131st Assembly to support stronger engagement and empowerment of women in disaster risk management.

“A number of countries involve women and men actively in disaster risk management and planning and have integrated gender dimensions into risk reduction and disaster response plans. However, women’s rights and their role as change agents in their societies are often overlooked in the disaster context, where women are categorized as a vulnerable groups,” Ms Wahlström said.

“Promoting and mobilizing women’s leadership and gender equality in building resilience is critical to the sustainability and progress of risk reduction priorities and sustainable development goals.”

Ms Wahlström was contributing to the Assembly’s General Debate ‘Achieving gender equality, ending violence against women’. She reminded parliamentarians of their important role in ensuring high-level participation in the upcoming Third UN World Conference on Disaster Risk Reduction, to be held in Sendai, Japan, in March 2015.

The 130th IPU Assembly in March 2014 adopted a landmark resolution “Towards risk-resilient development: taking into consideration demographic trends and natural constraints” recognizing the importance of disaster risk reduction to the work of parliamentarians worldwide.

“(The resolution) appeals to all governments to take immediate action to review national policies and regulations so as to ensure that socio-economic development is balanced against the need to reduce the risk, to the population and the economy, of disasters in the long run,” it said.

“(The resolution) also appeals to all governments to improve and enhance their mechanisms for disaster risk reduction and ensure that development policy and strategies build the disaster risk resilience of their people and the economy.”

The UN Office for Disaster Risk Reduction’s (UNISDR) advisory group of parliamentarians engages with MPs from all over the world to strengthen advocacy, build capacity and promote legislation.

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