At the COP27 climate change conference on 8 November 2022, United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres unveiled the “Executive Action Plan on Early Warnings for All” aimed at ensuring that everyone on the planet is protected by early warning systems within the next five years.
Early warnings that reach all is a key adaptation measure that saves lives and livelihoods, minimizes loss and damage, and provides a tenfold return on investment. Countries with limited early warning coverage have disaster mortality which is eight times higher than in countries with high coverage.
The realization of ‘Early Warnings for All’ is more critical in the Asia-Pacific, the world’s most disaster-impacted and populous region. The major disasters of 2022 and early 2023 have impacted countries across the entire development spectrum, for example, historic floods in Afghanistan and Pakistan, drought in China, Kiribati and Tuvalu, typhoons in the Philippines, heatwaves in India and Japan, the earthquakes in Turkey, Indonesia and Afghanistan, dzud in Mongolia and most recently the back-to-back cyclones and earthquake in Vanuatu.
It is clear that the disaster riskscape in Asia and the Pacific is intensifying, expanding and cascading with climate change. There is an urgent need therefore for accelerated climate action in Asia and the Pacific to advance multi-hazard early warning systems as a priority. Special attention should also be provided to the varying riskscapes of each subregion and in particular to countries that are at the forefront of climate change: Landlocked Developing Countries, notably Mongolia faces heightened slow onset risks related to desertification, drought, dzud and sand and dust storms, and Small-Island Developing States face more devastating typhoons and rising sea-levels.
Considering the above, the Government of Mongolia and Government of Fiji supported by UN ESCAP, UN Office for Disaster Risk Reduction, the World Meteorological Organization (WMO), Asian Disaster Preparedness Center (ADPC), International Telecommunication Union (ITU) and the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) are organizing an event on the sidelines of the seventy-ninth session of the Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP) to advance implementation of the global “Executive Action Plan on Early Warnings for All” in Asia and the Pacific. The event will build on the regional thematic report of the Midterm Review of the Sendai Framework, and recent WMO Regional Conferences of RA II (Asia) and RA V (South-West Pacific) and inform the proceedings of the upcoming 8th Session of the Committee for Disaster Risk Reduction in July 24-27, 2023.
The programme will include the high level remarks from Government of Mongolia, Government of Fiji, UNESAP, UNDRR, WMO. ADPC, IFRC, ITU, with more to be confirmed.
To register for this side event in person, please click https://indico.un.org/event/1003482/.
To register for this side event virtually, please click https://forms.office.com/e/Q0MhnLcv3i.
References
- Compendium of multi-hazard early warning cooperation
- G20 Disaster Risk Reduction Working Group Priority 1: Early Warnings for All, Input Paper, Early Warnings for All in Asia and the Pacific: Opportunities for action
