India, UK to launch coalition for disaster-proof infra at UN

Representational image: Pixabay

New Delhi: India and the UK will jointly launch a global Coalition for Disaster Resilient Infrastructure, an idea that Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi had reiterated at the G20 summit in Osaka, at the UN General Assembly in September, British High Commissioner Dominic Asquith said on Wednesday.

"We have agreed we should together launch the global coalition for disaster resilient infrastructure," he told reporters here.

India had announced the creation of a Coalition for Disaster Resilient Infrastructure (CDRI) soon after the Asian Ministerial Conference on Disaster Risk Reduction, held in New Delhi in 2016. At the Osaka summit, Prime Minister Modi had invited the G20 countries to join a global coalition on disaster resilience.

At the second International Workshop on Disaster Resilient Infrastructure (IWDRI) held in March this year, attended by experts and representatives from 33 countries, it was agreed to set up a Coalition for Disaster Resilient Infrastructure (CDRI) against the backdrop of the destruction of the Mozambique port city of Beira, home to 500,000 people.

The workshop was organised by India's National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA), along with the United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction (UNISDR) and in partnership with the Global Commission on Adaptation, United Nations Development Programme and the World Bank. The international workshop agreed that an Interim Secretariat of the CDRI will be established in New Delhi, with support from the Indian government.

The first International Workshop on Disaster Resilient Infrastructure (IWDRI 2018) was held in January 2018.

At the UN Secretary General's upcoming climate summit in September, different countries would lead in different subjects, with the UK to lead an initiative on resilience in climate change, while India would lead an initiative on the industry's role in tackling climate change, which would contribute to the international action on climate change, Asquith said.