14 July 2015, ADDIS ABABA – Details of an €80 million package of support from the European Union to disaster risk management across sub-Saharan Africa over the next five years, were unveiled today at the Financing for Development Conference.

Margareta Wahlström, the head of the UN Office for Disaster Risk Reduction (UNISDR), said: “This is a strategic long-term investment in building resilience in Africa. It will help to reduce mortality and economic losses by improving preparedness, early warning systems and putting in place systems for understanding how disaster losses are generated in order to avoid them in the future.”

Roberto Ridolfi, Director for Sustainable Growth and Development in Europeaid, said: “Resilience has many facets. Natural and climate related hazards dominate the disaster profile of Sub Saharan African. A holistic approach to building disaster resilience and to secure development gains in Africa, based on accurate risk information and improved decision support systems, is therefore necessary – and with this programme we will make an important contribution to achieve this goal.”

The programme “Building Disaster Resilience to Natural Hazards in Sub-Saharan African Regions, Countries and Communities”, an initiative of the African, Caribbean and Pacific Group of States, will be financed by the European Union within the frame of the 10th European Development Fund. It will support countries to reach the targets for subs\tantial reductions in disaster losses laid out in the new global agreement, the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction.

The five result areas are: enhanced regional coordination and DRR monitoring (African Union Commission and UNISDR), enhanced capacity of regional economic communities for coordination and planning (World Bank/GFDRR), improved capacity of regional climate centres for weather and climate services and real-time early warning systems (African Development Bank/ClimDev), improved risk knowledge for future risk modeling (UNISDR), and enhanced financial strategies for informed decision-making (World Bank/GFDRR).

About UNISDR: UNISDR is the UN office dedicated to disaster risk reduction. It is led by the Special Representative of the Secretary General for Disaster Risk Reduction and supports implementation of the Hyogo Framework for Action 2005-2015: Building the Resilience of Nations and Communities to Disasters which seeks “the substantial reduction of disaster losses, in lives and in the social, economic and environmental assets of communities and countries.”