Unesco-IHE, Dordrecht and Delft join UNISDR campaign Making Cities Resilient
Institute for Water Education Unesco-IHE, the municipality of Dordrecht and the municipality of Delft officially joined the World Disaster Reduction Campaign on Making Cities Resilient.
Currently 1706 cities across the world have already signed up to participate in this effort.
Dordrecht and Delft are the first Dutch cities to take part. Elizabeth Longworth, Director of the UN Office for Disaster Risk Reduction (UNISDR), attended the signing ceremony in Delft on 6 March.
Signing for participation (from left to right): Piet Sleeking (alderrman city of Dordrecht), Elizabeth Longworth (director UNISDR) and professor András Szöllösi-Nagy (rector Unesco-IHE) Making cities resilient
Making cities resilient
The global campaign 'Making Cities Resilient: My City is Getting Ready!' provides mayors, governors, and other local government leaders with a framework for disaster risk reduction. It points to good practices and tools and offers practical guidance to understand and take action.
The role of Unesco-IHE institute is to help the cities with useful tools: decision support systems, strategies, ideas for financing mechanisms, but also education, research and capacity development programmes, specifically tailored to meet local needs.
As one of the leading institutes in the world, there is a mandate to expand this knowledge further through the Institute's network and that of all partners.
Essential nr.4 is about investing in critical infrastructure like the SMART tunnel.
Ten Essentials
The campaign proposes a checklist of 'Ten Essentials for Making Cities Resilient' that can be implemented by mayors and local governments. These officials are at the closest level to the citizens and to their communities and play the first role in responding to crises and emergencies.
Local governments deliver essential services to their citizens, like health, education, transport, water, which need to be made resilient to disasters.
Achieving all, or even some of the top ten Essentials, will already help cities and local governments to get ready, reduce the risks and become resilient to disasters.
UNISDR will campaign together with its partners for this to happen from now until 2015 and beyond.
This news item was originally published on the website of Unesco-IHE.
More information
Unesco-IHE
Delft, the Netherlands
+31 15 212 29 21
www.unesco-ihe.org