Community engagement, raising awareness, and driving action

Community engagement, raising awareness, and driving action (pp.26-29) and Building urban resilience: Integrating climate and disaster risks into urban development (pp.50-54), during Understanding Risk Europe: Innovate for Resilience organized by World Bank Group and Global Facility for Disaster Reduction and Recovery (November 2019, Bucharest).

This conference brought together over 350 experts from governments, development institutions, academia, civil society organizations, and the private sector to address the shared burden of rising climate and disaster impacts across Europe, and explore how technology and innovation can help create more resilient societies. European countries are highly exposed to the impacts of natural hazards. Between 1980 and 2017, natural hazards, including devastating wildfires, earthquakes, and floods, cost European Union Member States over €511 billion (EEA 2019), most of which was not insured, and caused more than 91,000 casualties.

The idea of organizing “Understanding Risk Europe: Innovate for Resilience” was born during UR 2018 in Mexico City. The fifth global UR forum took place May 14-18, 2018 in Mexico City, Mexico at the Palacio de Minería. More than 1,050 representatives from 101 countries and 550+ organizations participated in UR2018. The first two days were dedicated to side events, and the following three days made up the main conference. The Forum featured 23 technical sessions and 57 side events, which included workshops and trainings, as well as numerous bilateral meetings. See session pages for slides and presentations from UR2018.