NEW YORK, 8 janvier 2013 (IRIN) - À Harare, capitale du Zimbabwe (3 000 000 habitants), un homme urine sur des ordures, à quelques pas de sa baraque en tôle. Il se bouche le nez pour ne pas sentir la puanteur qui s’échappe d’une latrine qui déborde non loin de là. À Ramallah, capitale du Territoire palestinien occupé (300 000 habitants), une jeune fille de 14 ans est réveillée par des crampes menstruelles – elle n’ira pas en classe, car son école n’a pas de toilettes permettant l’intimité.

This edition covers: (i) the highlights from the 2012 International Day for Disaster Reduction; (ii) the first-ever country peer review of the Hyogo Framework for Action (HFA) by the United Kingdom; (iii) the recognition of Sendai as a role model; and (iv) the adoption of Yogyakarta Declaration from the Fifth Asian Ministerial Conference for Disaster Risk Reduction.

Helen Clark, UNDP Administrator
‘Building Resilience: the importance of prioritising disaster risk reduction – a United Nations Development Programme Perspective’
Hopkins Lecture, University of Canterbury
Aurora Centre, Burnside High School, Christchurch
6.30 pm, Wednesday 15 August 2012

I am pleased to be delivering this year’s University of Canterbury Hopkins Lecture here at Aurora Centre, Burnside High School.

FOREWORD

2011 was an important year for the humanitarian community and for OCHA. There was barely a moment when our community was not faced with a relentless series of natural disasters, political crises and chronic emergencies.

But in the midst of this, we achieved something quite remarkable. At the end of December, humanitarian response partners, UN agencies, NGOs and the International Red Cross/Red Crescent Movement agreed on a series of reforms that focused on making our response efforts faster and more effective.

This Review analyzes some of the major events and trends related to natural disasters and humanitarian disaster response in 2011.

2011 was the most expensive year in terms of disaster losses in history, mostly because of a spate of disasters affecting developed countries. Globally, the ecnonomic cost of disasters in 2011 was $380 billion, of which $210 billion were the result of the earthquake and tsunmai in Japan. This was 72 percent higher than the losses in 2005, the second costliest year in history of disaster-related losses.

Las ciudades no están satisfaciendo las necesidades de los niños, advierte UNICEF

NUEVA YORK, 28 de febrero de 2012 - El proceso de urbanización excluye de los servicios vitales a cientos de millones de niños y niñas en las ciudades y los pueblos, advierte UNICEF en su informe Estado Mundial de la Infancia 2012: Las niñas y los niños en un mundo urbano.

302 human impact disasters claimed 29,782 lives; affected 206 million and inflicted record economic damages of $366 billion in 2011

Geneva, 18 January 2012 – For two consecutive years the long-term disasters trend has been bucked by major earthquakes which claimed thousands of lives and affected millions in both 2010 and 2011, according to new statistics published today by CRED and the UN office for disaster risk reduction, UNISDR.

Dear friends and colleagues,

IRIN is ending the year on a high.
Our climate change expert, Jaspreet Kindra, was invited to chair two separate panel discussions at COP 17 in Durban, and our PlusNews staffer, Keisha Rukikaire-Kagwa, was part of a satellite discussion on HIV in emergencies at the ICASA HIV/AIDS conference in Addis Ababa – great recognition of the quality of their work.

During 8 – 10 November 2011, H.E. Mr. Suvat Chirapant, Ambassador of the Kingdom of Thailand, led a delegation from the Royal Thai Embassy in Mexico on a mission to Port-au-Prince, Republic of Haiti. The Ambassador handed over contributions of 964,594.25 USD to H.E. President Michel Martelly of Haiti thru H.E. Laurent Lamoth, Haitian Foreign Minister.

The financial contribution was donated by private citizens and private corporations throughout Thailand. In light of the 2010 earthquake that devastated Haiti and brought hardship and suffering, to the Haitian people.