City resilience and increase communities’ preparedness for natural disasters.

Abstract

In urban areas, more than 50% of the world's population is living on just 2% of the land surface. As such the impact of disasters, such as earthquakes in these locations has a significant impact on social and economic activities. Many cities that experience earthquakes are located in Asia and developing countries and these natural disasters can be very challenging to populations who are already experiencing a range of social and economic difficulties. It is not only earthquakes, but severe weather events, like typhoons and storms (such as those seen in Istanbul and Tokyo in 2019) possibly caused by climate change, that can create community disaster zones. It is worth considering then, how city resilience can be increased in these areas to secure citizens’ safe lives and activities (Yazar et al., 2019). It has been proposed that city resilience largely relies on the performance of strong and resourceful citizens (Hernantes et al., 2019). In order to achieve a resilient city, it is argued, the city has to have good established partnerships amongst the population and the many organisations that function in these spaces; the cities internal and external stakeholders. In an age of fast urbanization and growing disaster dangers and vulnerabilities, it is important to consider the whole idea of city resilience. This study aims to present some actionable implications on this topic for policy makers, researchers, and practitioners working in both public and private sectors. This presentation will provide a basic idea how to embed the policies of UN SDG 11: Sustainable Cities and Communities and SDG 17: Partnerships for the Goals when we explore how to support and sustain the city's resilience for the future.