The City of Sendai and the Sendai Gender Equal Opportunity Foundation makes great strides to promote women’s leadership in DRR

The City of Sendai and the Sendai Gender Equal Opportunity Foundation makes great strides to promote women’s leadership in DRR.

Sendai City and the Sendai Gender Equal Opportunity Foundation have been organizing a program to build women’s leadership skills in making community decisions for disaster resilience and preparedness. The program does not only improve women’s awareness of disaster risk reduction and management, but it also deepens their understanding of their individual strengths and skills, which they can then bring to their own communities. It also builds a network of women who can learn from each other and motivate each other.

From 2016 – 2021, 132 women have graduated from the program coming from non-profit organizations, citizen’s and volunteer groups, neighborhood associations, and other groups. There is also diverse participation in terms of age, where 25% of the participants are over 60 years old, 55% are between 40 – 60 years old, and 20% are younger than 40. The program has also garnered positive feedback from its graduates who have commended it for its practical, hands-on and peer learning approach.

This program is one of the voluntary commitments published in the Sendai Framework Voluntary Commitments (SFVC) online platform. The platform allows stakeholders to inform the public about their work on DRR and is a useful tool to know who is doing what and where for the implementation of the Sendai Framework, which could foster potential collaboration among stakeholders. All stakeholders (private sector, civil society organizations, academia, media, local governments, etc.) working on DRR can submit their commitments and report on their progress and deliverables. Good practices and achievements will be highlighted through the online platform.