Embodying RET´s commitment to gender inclusion in DRR: Representatives of Parita Municipality participating in a BHA USAID/RET workshop to assist in the creation of their Municipal DRR Plan, Chitre, Panama, January 2024. Photo by RET.

Article by Sophia Robson, Disaster Risk Reduction Specialist for RET, and Paula Uribe, LAC Technical Manager for RET

Members of the RET team were honored to take part in consultations and actively participate in the feedback process for the creation of the Gender Action Plan to Support Implementation of the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction 2015 -2030 (Sendai GAP) based on their perspectives and experiences in the Latin American and Caribbean region and beyond, reiterating RET’s longstanding commitment to gender equality with experiences of the inclusion of vulnerable populations and environmentally sustainable and locally contextualized methodologies within the disaster risk reduction (DRR) field.

The Sendai Framework (2015-2030) recognizes that gender perspectives need to be integrated across the spectrum of DRR policies and practices, highlighting the imperative for women’s participation and leadership.

Mitzity Tugri, community knowledge holder from the Ngäbe-Bugle indigenous area, explaining the links between their cosmovision and Traditional Ecological Knowledge for Disaster Risk Reduction at a Youth Workshop run by BHA USAID and RET in Azuero Region, Panama, December 2023. Photo by Sophia Robson for RET.

READ THE PLAN

The Sendai Framework (2015-2030) recognizes that gender perspectives need to be integrated across the spectrum of DRR policies and practices, highlighting the imperative for women’s participation and leadership. The Sendai GAP expands this further, recognizing the unequal impact of Disaster Risk on women, girls and the amplification of these “gendered risks” that can be exacerbated by intersectional risk factors, such as persons living in poverty, having a disability, being displaced, or belonging to an indigenous group or the gender diversity. These intersectional connections obviously mirror RET’s founding principle of bridging the gaps the in the humanitarian-development-peace nexus.

RET would like to strongly encourage all those involved in Disaster Risk Reduction and Gender Equality to participate in the launch event, as wide dissemination and participation in the Sendai GAP is vital for the successful implementation of its 33 key actions at regional, national and local scales, in order to achieve the 9 key objectives.

The launch will be held at an in-person event on the margins of the UN Commission on the Status of Women (CSW68). The broadcast can be viewed live on Monday, March 18, 2024 from 1:15-2:30 PM PST, (New York Time) https://webtv.un.org, and for those registered to attend, in person at Conference Room 6, in the United Nations General Assembly Building, New York.

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