The past two decades have seen some of the worst disasters recorded. Tropical storms, floods, droughts and earthquakes have caused massive loss of life and property, and set back development achievements across the globe.

Disasters have killed more than a million people, affected 4.4 billion and cost the global economy more than 2 trillion dollars since 1994. With populations exploding and urbanization increasing rapidly, more and more people, often those who live in the poorest countries, are being exposed to disaster risk. At the same time, climate change threatens to push that risk perilously out of control, as extreme and more variable weather becomes more common.

The message is simple: unless disaster risk reduction is integrated into development, the many-layered cost of disasters will continue to rise.