Awareness Day

International Day for Disaster Risk Reduction

October 13, 2026 Recurs yearly

Multigenerational family preparing their home for severe weather, representing household disaster preparedness and resilience.

2026 Theme

Resilience Starts at Home

Campaign Description

Established by the UN in 1989, this day promotes global awareness of disaster risk reduction and community resilience-building.

Theme Focus

The 2026 theme highlights household- and community-level preparedness as the foundation of broader disaster resilience, emphasizing local action, early warning systems, and family-level planning as first lines of defense.

Key Priorities

  • Build and maintain disaster-resilient homes.
  • Ensure housing is located through risk-informed land-use planning.
  • Strengthen and enforce resilient building standards and codes.
  • Make resilient housing affordable and accessible, rather than something available only to wealthier households.
  • Ensure disaster warnings reach every household, including people with disabilities, older people and others who may face barriers to receiving or understanding alerts.
  • Help households understand the hazards affecting where they live.
  • Strengthen household preparedness and evacuation planning.
  • Include communities in decisions about housing, infrastructure and local disaster planning.
  • Address the disproportionate risks faced by women, children, older people, people with disabilities and low-income households.
  • Strengthen climate adaptation alongside disaster risk reduction.
  • Encourage private-sector investment in resilient construction and infrastructure.
  • Recognize that prevention and preparedness reduce the human and economic costs of disasters.
  • Treat resilience as a long-term investment rather than something addressed only after a disaster.

Key Concepts

  • Disaster risk reduction
  • Disaster resilience
  • Resilient housing
  • Early warning systems
  • Evacuation planning
  • Risk-informed development
  • Land-use planning
  • Climate adaptation
  • Community resilience
  • Accessible housing
  • Disaster preparedness
  • Emergency planning
  • Displacement
  • Social protection
  • Critical infrastructure
  • Sendai Framework

Campaign Resources & Support

View Awareness Calendar