The Third Arab Ministerial Forum on Housing & Urban Development DUBAI

UNDRR session at the Forum is "Making Urban Infrastructure Disaster Resilient"

The session will be a moderated panel discussion with 5 panelists from local governments, private sector and experts from UNDRR and UN-Habitat. The panel discussion will focus on the following key issues (with indication of tentative panelists)

1. Need for urban resilience and importance of making infrastructure disaster resilient to minimize future risks – UNDRR

2. State of Arab cities and opportunities for resilient urban development in the Arab states - UNHABITAT

3. Role of local level planning and demonstration of a good practice in making city resilient – Perspective from a highly urbanized city government (Dubai city, Aqaba city- TBC)

4. Role of private sector in making cities infrastructure resilient – A representative from UNDRR ARISE (Private sector Alliance)

Targeted Audience:

• Official delegations of Arab countries

• Local governments

• UN agencies

• All stakeholders (media, private sector, academia, etc.)

Panelists:

• Mr. Sujit Kumar Mohanty, Chief of UNDRR   - Regional Arab State Office 

• Maj-General Abdullah Khalifa Al Merri, Commander-in-Chief of the Dubai Police

• Dr. Erfan Ali, Director, Regional Office for Arab States, UNHABITAT

• Mr. Khaled Abuaisheh, Director of Planning and Studies and head of DRR unit at the Aqaba Special Economic Zone Authority

• Mr. Ahmed Riyadh, ARISE Member, Private sector representative