The Australian Pavilion was the central feature of the exhibition hall at the Asia-Pacific Ministerial Conference on Disaster Risk Reduction at the Brisbane Convention and Exhibition Centre last week.
Staff from Natural Hazards Research Australia (pictured below) were at the pavilion to showcase research in community recovery, warnings and communications, and cultural burning to the more than 3000 delegates from 40 countries.
Australia partnered with the United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction (UNDRR) to host the conference, with the Centre invited to work the Australian Government and other agencies on the program and exhibition.
The Minister for Emergency Management, Senator Murray Watt, opened the Australian Pavilion, which also featured projects and activities from other partners including the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, National Emergency Management Agency, Australian Institute for Disaster Resilience, Australian Climate Service and CSIRO.
The Recovery Capitals project on community recovery was a feature of one of the information sessions. Prof John Bates, Research Strategy Director, led the interactive lunchtime session (pictured below) with input from John Richardson from Red Cross Australia and Prof David Johnston, from Massey University.
The conference was centred around the theme, 'From Crisis to Resilience: Transforming the Asia-Pacific Region’s future through disaster risk reduction'.
The conference is the main regional platform in the Asia-Pacific for promoting coordination and cooperation on disaster risk reduction and the implementation of the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction. It brought together UN Member States, intergovernmental organisations, international and national organisations and stakeholder groups to accelerate progress on disaster risk reduction.
The day after the conference Centre CEO Andrew Gissing, Research Strategy Director Dr John Bates, and Node Research Manager Nicola Moore participated in the Queensland Inspector-General of Emergency Management’s research forum, with Andrew providing an update on the progress of the research program and the Centre sponsoring the morning tea break.