Pacific Platform for Disaster Risk Management launches UN report warning of rising economic losses due to disasters and climate change

The Global Assessment Report on Disaster Risk Reduction (GAR11) titled Revealing Risk, Redefining Development will be launched today in Auckland (New Zealand) at the Third Session of the Pacific Platform for Disaster Risk Management which is the main gathering of disaster risk management experts and decision makers in the Pacific region.

Andrew Maskrey, the coordinating lead author of the GAR will present the main findings of the UN report highlighting the main disaster trends and risks in the Pacific Island and progress made in implementing the Hyogo Framework for Action which is a main plan of action to reduce disaster losses by 2015.

The report which was launched globally by the United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon last May in Geneva, Switzerland shows that globally mortality risk associated with weather-related disasters has considerably decreased whereas economic losses due to disasters continue to rise across the globe and in the Pacific, critically threatening the economies of Small Island Development States. The report also urges governments to invest more in disaster risk reduction and climate change adaptation policies.

Government officials from 22 Pacific island countries and territories present at the Pacific Platform will be invited to discuss a "roadmap" for a regional policy framework that will integrate disaster risk management and climate change adaptation policies to safeguard regional developments.

Since its global launch in Geneva, the GAR has been launched in 23 cities across the globe :Bangkok (Barbados), Beirut (Lebanon), Bridgetown (Barbados), Brussels (Belgium), Cairo (Egypt), Canberra (Australia), Colombo (Sri Lanka), Dhaka (Bangladesh), Hanoi (Viet Nam), Incheon (Republic of Korea), Jakarta (Indonesia), Kuwait City (Kuwait), London (United Kingdom), Manila (Philippines(, Miami (United States), Nairobi (Kenya), New York (United States), Oslo (Norway), Panama City (Panama), Rouseau (Dominica), San Salvador (El Salvador), Tokyo (Japan), and Washington D.C. (United States).