Towards a post-2015 framework for Disaster Risk Reduction BUILDING THE RESILIENCE OF NATIONS AND COMMUNITIES TO DISASTERS

1. We consider it is important to prepare regulations, but it should not interfere with the activities of private companies. So, national and regional governments should serve basic legislation and regulation for disaster reduction. In the meantime, we realized that cooperation of various sectors is needed and effective through our activities in the disaster affected area from the 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake (GEJE). And also, the usual cooperation which is beneficial for all concerned in ordinary operations and economic activities seems to be effective in both ordinary and emergency situation. For example, we can consider how private and government sector should cooperate at emergency situation. We believe that creating such practical cooperation is more important and effective than setting codes and regulations more strictly.

Currently, we lead making the “Tohoku Alliance”, a platform consisted of stakeholders from private, government and academic sectors for region-wide cooperation for disaster risk reduction and recovery. This is a challenge for integration, utilization and share of good practices and lessons from the GEJE by constructing a system for them.

GEJE caused the unprecedented damage and affected in Tohoku region of Japan. While at the same time, the disaster brought a great deal of information and data.
In each affected area, there are good practices and lessons from private and public sectors. In addition, multi-stakeholders have used their existing strength and contributed to reconstruction in the affected areas from their respective positions.

The information and data about GEJE have been collected and analyzed by academic and research institutions, nongovernmental organizations, government agencies, and private sector organizations. However, we could not have considered how to put them into practical use. In other words, we could have stocked such information and data, but it is not clarified to utilize for next disaster.

To utilize a lot of important experiences and practices, we consider that we need to make a system. We define the system as a leading role to integrate, utilize and share good practices and lessons. We would like to make the system and framework, for example the standardization of works during reconstruction, and also to be able to use the system “Tohoku model” all over the world. After making the system and framework, we are considering about modification to apply for private and public sector in developing countries.

In discussion at this platform, we uses the latest findings based on the experiences and lessons learned from the recently unprecedented disaster in 2011,GEJE. So we can make and provide up-to-date standard in the project. And also, there is possibility of occurring mega earthquakes and tsunamis somewhere around the world, and if the disaster occurs, it could cause widespread damages.
The platform is set in Tohoku region, but it needs support and cooperation by the national government.

We have a slight concern about enforcement, but if stakeholders recognize the Tohoku model as useful and user-friendly one, it becomes widely used among many countries and regions apprehending the difficulties from disaster.

2. Speaking as a financial agency, finance incentives such as loans and subsidies and so on, were effective. For instance, at Fukushima, many companies return to reinforce its facilities. Not only the subsidy programs for equipment investment of private sector companies in the affected areas, but also financial support measures made possible under the Act on Special Reconstruction Zones, which allows for subsidies on loan interest, have been definitely effective.

In addition, there are new financial programs in private sector, which adopt the way of traditional credit ratings that are indicators of the company’s credit worthiness, but also ratings based on valuation for disaster risk reduction (DRR) and prevention, tying in financial incentives, such as our Enterprise Resilience Rated Loan Program.
The rating is designed as an objective third-party evaluation, giving recognition to the recipient company’s efforts in DRR/Business Continuity Management (BCM) to external stakeholders, and as a method to initiate dialogue on the necessity for BCM and DRR measures to the company’s internal audience.