The World Conference on Disaster Reduction held 18-22 January 2005 in Kobe, Japan in which UN and government representatives attended shared common views on working together to reduce losses from natural disasters in the Asia-Pacific Region. At the Conference, Executive Secretary of UNESCAP and Under-Secretary-General of the UN, Mr Kim Hak-Su stated that UNESCAP is looking forward to initiatives to set up targets for minimizing loss of lives or damage to guide regional efforts on disaster risk management.

'The December-2004 Tsunami disaster in the Indian Ocean is a strong testimony of the urgent need to address the risk of common threats caused by natural hazards for sustainable development in the Asia-Pacific Region,' the UNESCAP Executive Secretary said. He also noted that the number of death caused by natural disasters in the region accounted for about 85% of that of the World during the last century.

He further explained that the recent surveys, including those conducted by UNESCAP, showed that the most common natural disasters in the Asian and Pacific region includes floods, earthquakes, droughts, storm surges, tsunamis and haze. He added that economic loss of these disasters during the period from 1999 to 2003 exceeded USD 380 billion. The UNESCAP Executive Secretary reiterated that the most important challenge for the region is therefore to minimize the loss of lives and damage and expressed that UNESCAP is looking forward to initiatives to guide regional efforts on disaster risk management.

For further information on the Conference on Disaster Reduction go to:
www.unisdr.org/wdcr/