World Bank cites Makati as one of the world's champ in Disaster Risk Reduction

Philippine Information Agency: Makati and two other foreign cities are being considered as “disaster risk reduction champions” by the World Bank-funded Global Facility for Disaster Risk Reduction (GFDRR) which is currently holding a city-to-city sharing initiative in Quito, Ecuador.

After the sharing session, organizers said they see Makati City, Kathmandu, and Quito as “international and regional resource centers” for other cities in the area of disaster risk reduction.

Under the GFDRR initiative, the peer learning exchange will continue among the three cities even after the study visits. There will also be residency program for a sustained learning process among them and the most vulnerable cities in the developing world.

Mayor Jejomar Erwin S. Binay said the Makati delegation, composed of seven key city officials and personnel, has joined delegations from Kathmandu, Nepal and Quito, Ecuador in the study visit, which was the first leg of a series of activities under the South-South Cooperation Programme of GFDRR.

“This is a very significant event in the histories of our cities since we will be sharing the best practices we have with each other, in our quest for better solutions, programs and action plans that will strengthen our defenses against disasters,” Binay said in his message to the delegates that was delivered by City Councilor Marie Alethea Casal-Uy.

Makati was cited as a “Role Model City” by the United Nations International Strategy for Disaster Reduction (UNISDR) last May for its “Making Cities Resilient” campaign, and was hailed by World Bank as one of “East Asia’s Climate Resilient Cities in 2008....

Greenbelt mall in Makati City, Philippines, shot by Mike Gonzalez (TheCoffee), Wikimedia Commons, under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license