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Expert Opinions & Stories
The development paradigm has shifted to ‘digital by default’ as a norm, reshaping societies and economies. As a hub for digitally driven innovations, Asia and the Pacific is well positioned to…
Loss and damage @ COP 29 Baku: 4 key takeaways
In July 2024, cascading impacts of multiple landslides in Wayanad, Kerala—a state of India – have killed more than 400 people and resulted in colossal socio-economic impacts. The landslides were…
First and Last Mile Access to Public Transport: Safe and Inclusive Mobility Solutions for Asian Cities
In the Asia-Pacific region, due to urban sprawl and transport infrastructure characteristics, the distance from a location to a public transport node is often longer than the 500m mark to…
As cities in Asia and the Pacific continue to expand, the demand for transport services to accommodate commuters is increasingly challenging. Integration of public transport systems has emerged as a…
Unpacking 2023, the warmest year on record
2023 was the warmest year on record. The latest Copernicus Climate Change Service highlights that February 2023 to January 2024 was the first time that we experienced 12 consecutive months of…
On 12/13 November 1970, the world’s deadliest tropical cyclone ‘Bhola’ killed more than 300,000 people in Bangladesh. The hard lesson learnt from ‘Bhola’ was not having an effective cyclone warning…
On 4 October 2023, a cloudburst over Lhonak Lake in North Sikkim triggered a glacial lake outburst flood (GLOF) in the Teesta river basin, which claimed over 30 lives, destroyed the 1,200 MW…
The New Delhi Leaders’ Declaration was unanimously adopted during the G20 Leader’s Summit on 9-10 September 2023. It has many takeaways covering a variety of pressing global challenges, including…
The last few weeks have seen large scale floodings in southwestern China and northwestern India including its capital, Delhi. The deluge in China and India is no exception to an emerging trend…
On 14 May 2023, cyclone Mocha hit Myanmar. Accompanied by sustained winds of 180-190 km/h and violent gusts, torrential rainfall and flooding, Mocha made the landfall in a context of…
Drought is a slow-onset disaster that causes significant damage to the environment. Unlike most other natural hazards, the effects of drought often accumulate slowly over an extended period…
With a population of around 4.9 billion people, the Asia-Pacific region is home to 63 per cent of the world’s inhabitants. As of 2021, the region accounts for around 37 per cent of global GDP (USD 35…
On this World Meteorological Day, WMO and ESCAP unpack the 2023 theme: Weather, Climate and Water across Generations – through a series of three opinion pieces focused on the Asia-Pacific region,…
Vanuatu twin cyclones underscore the Pacific’s vulnerability to compounding climate-disaster risks
Two destructive Category 4 tropical cyclones, Judy and Kevin, and an earthquake of 6.5 magnitude impacted over 80 per cent of the Vanuatu population from 1 to 3 March 2023. To address this emergency…
Multiple earthquakes, the strongest being of 7.7 magnitude, struck southern Türkiye and northern Syria on 6 February 2023. The earthquake was extremely powerful, and more deadly because it…
When the 2004 Indian Ocean Tsunami claimed the lives of 230,000 people in a matter of hours, the world realized the gap in preparedness in absence of effective early warning. It was this shared…
"The Pakistani people are facing a monsoon on steroids -- the relentless impact of epochal levels of rain and flooding,” stated UN Secretary-General António Guterres recently as floods submerged much…
Shaping our digital future
Asia and the Pacific is the most digitally divided region of the world, and South-East Asia is the most divided subregion. The Covid-19 pandemic detonated a “digital big bang” that spurred people,…
Five action points for a resilient future
“The global battle to reduce disaster losses by 2030 will be won or lost in Asia and the Pacific” – Mami Mizutori, Special Representative of the Secretary-General for Disaster Risk Reduction.
This…
Reclaiming our future
The Asia-Pacific region is at a crossroads today – to further breakdown or breakthrough to a greener, better, safer future.
Since the Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP…