Strengthening the Legal Foundation of Disaster Risk Reduction

Laws and regulations serve as a foundation for building community resilience. Utilizing the law is essential to both reducing existing disaster risk and preventing new risks from arising. By enacting and enforcing laws that promote risk-informed development, resilient infrastructure, early warning systems, and inclusion, countries can enhance their capacity to withstand and recover from disasters, reduce inequalities, and safeguard lives and livelihoods.

At the same time, there is increasing attention paid to how States protect and promote human rights as part of disaster risk reduction, mitigation and response as well as post-disaster recovery, rehabilitation and reconstruction efforts. Disasters have wide-ranging impacts on human rights, exacerbating existing vulnerabilities and inequalities while also creating new ones; while violations of human rights contribute to vulnerability and exposure, increasing disaster risk. A human rights-based approach to disaster risk reduction provides States and non-State actors with a practical framework for decision-making and action grounded in international human rights law, through which to anchor, review and guide relevant laws, policies and projects.