Granting International Status To CDRI By Signing Of Headquarter Agreement

The Government of India for a long time has been working relentlessly to work in tandem with the Sustainable Development Goals. Along with the support of the United Nations Office of the Disaster Risk Reduction, it has established the Coalition for Disaster Resilient Infrastructure (CDRI) which is a cumulative effort and coalition set up of multi-stakeholder partnership of several Governments in the Global sustainable space, besides the support of the agencies of the United Nations, multilateral development banks, academic institutions and several private entities like Asian Development Bank, United Nations Development Program (UNDP), United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction (UNDRR), the World Bank, and ARISE: The Private Sector Alliance for Disaster Resilient Societies.

CDRI has a multi-fold function, since it came into being in 2019, under the able leadership of the Government of India. It promotes the resilience of infrastructure and development systems in order to mitigate climate and disaster risks in all the countries involved, ensuring the Sustainable development. In this way there is retrofit and development of the basic framework for sustainable development that ensures Universal access to the basic services and enables prosperity.

The CDRI, led by Amit Prothi, Director General, has recently signed the Headquarter Agreement with the Government of India via Noor Rahman Sheikh, the Joint Secretary of the Ministry of External Affairs. This shall entitle the CDRI as an independent and International Legal Entity and shall enable it to enjoy all the immunities, privileges and rights under the United Nations (Privileges & Immunities) Act, 1947.

The communities at risk in terms of environmental degradation, that are also prone to climate change risks can benefit greatly from this step of making CDRI a truly International Organization and there could be wider access to disaster  resilient infrastructure for these countries with a greater focus on capacity development.

The acceptance of CDRI has seen a positive growth with around 31 countries and 8 international organization showing allegiance to its Charters, thereby leading the way forward for those countries in their early stage to adopt good practices in the field of infrastructure development, fostering resilience while having compliance and regulatory mechanism in line with the 2030 SDG.

The Member states can now help each other to design, construct, maintain and run the financial investments, governance infrastructure to address future climate challenges and hazards and bring about an inclusivity in such risk management drives. There is no obligatory donation to be made by the member states and the funds are given on a voluntary basis.

The framework  also draws from the Sendai Framework that works in this area and also ensures that there are  private investments through structural, nonstructural and functional disaster risk prevention and reduction measures in critical facilities. New codes, reconstruction process and rehabilitation methods shall be designed at the local and national level, focusing on standardised materials for the building while keeping up the maintenance on a timely basis. However, adoption of any  framework needs approval of the Governing Council.

Thus CDRI’s initiative of raising awareness, knowledge sharing in developing infrastructure, adopting frameworks for codes, guidelines for design, planning while ensuring least damages to these infrastructure that shall help in fund arrangement, develop risk governance and developing strategies for risk transfer and supporting the resilient infrastructure, under India’s leadership shall be another changing dimension in the global cooperation, also in the politically volatile South Asian region and enable a greater harmony among the Member Nation in the globalised context.