25 August 2008: Achim Steiner UN Under-Secretary General and
the UN Environment Programme’s (UNEP) Executive Director, spoke on risk and
climate change at the International Disaster Risk Conference (IDRC), which
convened in Davos, Switzerland, from 25-29 August 2008.

Noting the decline of
community resilience due to the loss of critical ecosystems, he warned of
increased migration, water stress and flooding in densely-populated areas, and
called for scaled up adaptation efforts.
To effectively deal with the changing
patterns of risk, he emphasized the need for political will and financing to
support the scaling up of implementation efforts, saying, “climate proofing
economies to minimize vulnerability to future disasters in now crucial.”
Underscoring that the cost of adaptation will be significantly less than the
costs of damage, he cited the UN/ISDR Partnership for Environment and Disaster
Risk Reduction, which seeks to facilitate collective action towards better
coordinated “environmental efforts in pursuit of disaster risk reduction and
sustainable development.” [UNEP
Executive Director Steiner’s speech] [Conference website]