G20: 1st Disaster Risk Reduction Working Group meeting Begins in Gandhinagar

Gandhinagar: The First G20 Disaster Risk Reduction Working Group meeting under India’s G20 Presidency began at Gandhinagar in Gujarat today. Principal Secretary to the Prime Minister Dr P K Mishra and Minister of State for Communications Devusinh Chauhan inaugurated the meeting.

Around 100 delegates from the G20 member countries, invitee countries and from nine International organisations are participating in the three-day event.

Five priority areas have been identified for the meeting which include an early warning for all, resilient infrastructure and improving the National system for financing Disaster Risk Reduction.

Addressing the gathering, Dr P K Mishra said that in its G20 Presidency, India has accorded disaster risk reduction a high priority. On the occasion, Minister of State for Communications Devusinh Chauhan said that disasters adversely affect development goals and disrupt progress. In view of this, making disaster risk reduction is imperative.

The second Sherpa meeting of the G20 Summit under India’s Presidency began at the idyllic village of Kumarakom in Kerala. Over 120 delegates from G20 member nations are participating in the event being chaired by India’s Sherpa Amitabh Kant.

The meeting will bring together nine invitee countries and various international and regional organisations. During the four-day meeting, the delegates will hold multi-lateral discussions on G20’s economic and developmental priorities, besides addressing contemporary global challenges.

Two side events also began as part of the Sherpa meet one on Digital Public Infrastructure and the other on Green Development. The event on Digital Public Infrastructure will deliberate on India’s experience and leadership in building an inclusive and effective implementation of DPIs for enabling the meaningful delivery of public and private services.

A Digital Experience Zone, set up as part of the event will showcase the country’s success story in solving societal and service delivery problems using DPI and will also demonstrate various digitization initiatives built on it.

The event on Green Development is being held against the backdrop of the urgent need for a revamped and reinvigorated international enabling environment that strongly supports low carbon growth for all. It will aim to galvanize G-20s efforts to facilitate sustainable finance and promote demand-driven and scalable development solutions tailored to local conditions.