Disaster risk management in public investment in highways: Why is defining critical projects important for sustainable investment?

This report documents the assignment, commissioned by the Global Initiative on Disaster Risk Management, to assist countries in Latin American and the Caribbean in organizing their infrastructure in terms of disaster risks. The assignment - part of the 2030 agenda of the Paris Agreement, the Sendai Framework and Habitat III which all highlight the role of public investment in infrastructure with regard to disaster risk management - focused on the road infrastructure of Chile, Costa Rica and Mexico.

The following steps were established: the integration of the models for the 3 countries (Chile, Costa Rica, and Mexico) in a Latin American model and the development of a pilot instance for the application of the model, assessing some selected highways and analyzing the criticality classification of the associated sections. Given the specific situation of the change of government in Mexico and the announcements about not building new highways in the new administration, and giving priority to reviewing guidelines, methodologies and processes, an opportunity arises to incorporate new methodologies in the different public administration branches, beyond the revision of legal area.