Mary-Louise Hoffman
AECOM and IBM have collaborated to design a benchmark tool to help UN member states’ local governments assess their level of preparedness for earthquakes, floods, storms and fires.
The companies developed the scorecard for the UN Office for Disaster Risk Reduction with the goal of helping cities withstand natural disasters as well as protect lives and communities, IBM said Monday.
According to IBM, the tool has 80 evaluation categories and covers the planning, engineering, financial, environmental and social elements of disaster management.
“Cities are expanding rapidly and this presents an opportunity to both address existing risk and avoid the accumulation of new risks,” said Margareta Wahlstrom, head of UNISDR.
Wahlstrom added the tool “is designed to help cities establish a baseline measurement of their current level of disaster resilience, identify priorities for investment and action and track progress over time.”
The city of Coimbatore, India is currently testing the Disaster Resilience Scorecard platform.
Peter Williams, IBM chief technology officer for big green innovations, and Michael Nolan, AECOM global technical director of climate adaptation, will discuss the building blocks for disaster risk reduction at the World Cities Summit in Singapore on Tuesday.
