27-29 November 2013 (Bangkok, Thailand)
The third session of the Committee on Disaster Risk Reduction, organized by the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP), was held at the United Nations Conference Centre in Bangkok, Thailand, from 27 to 29 November 2013.
As a cooperation of this committee, the ADRC sent one representative from IRP secretariat to attend. The forum's many participants included officials from UNESCAP member countries, and experts from intergovernmental organizations.
During the session titled "Item 4: Mainstreaming disaster risk reduction into development", Mr. Shingo Kouchi, ADRC Senior Expert as well as IRP Senior Recovery Expert, valued the Government and people of UNESCAP member countries' high ability to promote recovery and reconstruction efforts following each large-scale disasters. Mr. Kouchi also noted that ADRC and IRP have long been in help to ADRC member countries' efforts to utilize Japanese technologies, experiences, and lessons related to disaster risk reduction. Among those is three month-long Visiting Researcher (VR) Program, a capacity building program which ADRC offers government officials, and we are pleased to observe many former VRs are now playing a central role at their ministries in charge of disaster management.
Mr. Kouch also emphasized the importance of everyday preparedness by citizens, in addition to the government efforts, when a massive disaster strikes. In this connection, the two big events; ADRC's "Asian Conference on Disaster Reduction" to be held in Tokyo, Japan in 4-6 March 2014, and IRP's "International Recovery Forum" to be held in Kobe, Japan in 21 January 2014, will show the evidence of progress of disaster reduction and preparedness toward the next UN World Conference on Disaster Reduction in 2015.
