UNDRR Asia-Pacific COVID-19 Brief: Opportunities for Resilient Recovery

As countries continue to meet the immediate needs of the COVID-19 pandemic, the crisis is forcing policymakers to consider the unavoidable trade-offs between saving lives and preserving jobs and livelihoods. Throughout Asia-Pacific, governments are considering options for restarting their economic engines and putting people back to work, including in key sectors that have been most impacted by the pandemic. Experts are considering what recovery might look like once the virus is contained but also how countries can use this recovery opportunity to achieve longer-term resilience goals, including decarbonisation of the world economy.

This brief was developed by the UN Office for Disaster Risk Reduction, Regional Office for Asia and the Pacific, in collaboration with United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP) and the Secretariat of the International Recovery Platform (IRP). It aims to highlight the challenges, lessons learned from past disaster recovery events, and recommendations on how countries can start preparing for a recovery that is climate-sensitive, inclusive and contributes to global efforts to build more resilient systems that are better placed to prevent such crises in the future. The brief reflects interventions and feedback from the UNDRR Asia-Pacific webinar on 7 May 2020, titled ‘COVID-19: Opportunities for Resilient Recovery,’ which was co-organized with ESCAP and IRP.