Regional Multi-stakeholder Workshop on the Role of Telecommunications/ICTs for Disaster Risk Reduction and Management for Arab Region

The world we live in today is inter-connected and fast-changing, largely due to the rapid development of information and communication technologies (ICTs). As the World Economic Forum fittingly states, ICTs represent our “collective nerve system”, impacting and connecting every fabric of our lives through intelligent, adaptive and innovative solutions. Indeed, ICTs are tools that can help solve some of our economic, social and environmental challenges, and promote more inclusive and sustainable development.

The increased access to information and knowledge through development of ICT has the potential to significantly improve the livelihoods of the poor and marginalized and promote gender equality. ICTs can serve as a bridge connecting people from different countries and sectors in the region and beyond by providing more efficient, transparent and reliable means and platforms for communication and cooperation. 

Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) play a significant role in disaster prevention, mitigation response and recovery. Timely, predictable and effective information is much needed by government agencies and other humanitarian actors involved in rescue operations and decision-making processes.

There is a growing recognition that climate variability and extreme weather events are likely to increase, thereby affecting the vulnerability of countries to both climate hazards, such as floods, tropical storms and drought, and non-climate hazards, such as groundwater salinization, which would have an impact on the growth and development of countries and the livelihoods of communities. Many cities in the Arab region are at risk of natural disasters. Economic, social and environmental losses resulting from a disaster. 

And yes, we are taking climate action on a global level, but in parallel we need to have a strategy of resilience as well…. because sustainability in this context is a component of resilience. Let us look into the definition of resilience: Resilience is the ability of a system to prepare for threats, absorb impacts, recover and adapt following persistent stress or a disruptive event. 

A resilient city is a sustainable metropolis. In 2009, many Arab cities joined the UNISDR campaign “My city is getting ready.” In 2015, the UNISDR asked municipalities, which took part in the campaign, to use Local Government Self-Assessment Tool to report on their state of preparedness.

As you all know the UN organization has undergone an organizational reform to support achieving the sustainability 2030 agenda, this leads me to highlight how adopting a multilateral framework to mitigating risk is important to achieving resilience of a city.

We must mitigate and adopt to climate change. At the same time, we need to invest in disaster and risk management. Disaster risk management must be part of development, but it must be also considered a first line of defense against the uncertainty that is coming tomorrow.

We need to take a multilateral approach in the telecommunications arena as well… we need the action in the public sector, we need frameworks and public policy, we need awareness and investment in the private sector, and we need civil society and community to engage. 

Every country and every government can take steps now no matter where they are on the development trajectory to try to start to invest in their own resilience.

We must move from a tradition of response to a culture of prevention…a culture of resilience.

Thank you.