Attachments
Introduction
The adoption of the Sendai Framework paved the way for substantial advancements in building back better, including incorporating disaster-resilient designs, progress in assessment, planning, financing and recovery preparedness, among others, and achieving better recovery outcomes. While disaster recovery experience in the past six years reveals the extent to which recovery practice and policy have progressed, challenges remain in achieving the ambitions of building back stronger, faster, and more inclusive towards sustainable and resilient development pathways.
As we approach the midpoint of the Sendai Framework, planning for disaster recovery has become more complex because of uncertainty and the changing risk landscape. We are confronted not only by climate change, which is already affecting every region of the world in various ways through intensified climate-related events, including heavy rainfall and associated flooding, intense drought and extreme heat waves (IPCC, 2021) but also by compounding, cascading and systemic risks. These threaten to exacerbate risks in countries and communities with limited capacity to address present and evolving vulnerabilities. Therefore, the pace of implementation of the Sendai Framework needs to accelerate alongside the changing climate to address the urgency of climate change, and the impacts it could have on climate-linked extreme events.
The International Recovery Forum 2022 (IRF 2022) was held both online and on-site at the Kobe International Convention Center in Kobe, Japan on 19 January 2022. With the theme, “Redesigning Systems for Resilience through Recovery: Assessing Progress and the Unfinished Agenda at the Midpoint of the Sendai Framework”, the forum convened 400 participants and speakers from 65 countries. The annual forum is a key activity managed by the International Recovery Platform (IRP) to share experiences, learning, and evidence in resilient recovery and building back better, and support progress against Priority 4 of the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction 2015-2030.
This volume of the Herald summarizes the proceedings and main outcomes of the forum. It reflects on the discussions of the progress in implementing building back better in recovery within Priority 4 of the Sendai Framework, the challenges that remain, and the forward-looking agenda for continued progress.