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E-resilience monitoring toolkit : methodological notes and pilot countries’ profiles
Get PDFThe on-going pandemic of COVID-19 has shown the great extent with which we rely upon the digital services to sustain our normal existence.
The same services during the time of need can transform into a source of innovation and hope, and become powerful tools to manage hazard and exposure. While there is a little doubt that our recovery effort success with leaving no one behind will depend on the reliable, high quality, accessible and affordable digital services and the underlying ICTs.
This is why the cooperation strengthening regional e-resilience, which includes using ICTs as tools during crises and ICTs own resilience, is critically important and could not come at the better time.
By putting robust and scalable measurement as a first step, ESCAP secretariat is writing in hopes to expand the options available to the Member States. The toolkit should become useful in policy deliberations of the regional economic groups, as well as facilitate a greater regional cooperation and dialogue on practical steps to address e-resilience.
This paper aims to establish baseline methodology and a point for further discussions driven by the membership.
In particular, the paper desribes process of initial e-resilience data collection, techniques used to transform the data into a single dataset, operations with data, such as missing values treatment and normalization, and visualization of the data.
The dataset for the several pilot country are already available online for all members as the ESCAP web resource.
To show the potential of this tool, based on the dataset published in the form of an online visually appealing dashboard, we put together several pilot country profiles with specific policy recommendations.
Hopes are high for decisive actions in the upcoming decade – the last before the end of the current Sustainable Development Goals agenda and the first for the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, as well as the ESCAP initiative on Asia-Pacific Information Superhighway (AP-IS) 2022-2026 Action Plan.
Data-driven and smart action is needed more than ever. Resilience of the digital requires strong policy response, and ESCAP is ready to assist Member States in reaching their objectives in line with the vision of prosperous, safe, resilient, and digital, Asia-Pacific.</p
Informal and traditional social protection in Samoa
Get PDFThe Informal and Traditional Social Protection in Samoa policy brief was developed under the 'Strengthening Resilience of Pacific Island States through Universal Social Protection’ programme, a joint initiative between the United Nations Country Team (UNCT) and the Governments of Samoa, Cook Islands, Niue and Tokelau. The brief was designed to substantively review the ways in which community-based services function as local safety nets and examine their role in the overarching social protection framework of Samoa.
Despite the deep-rooted history and extensive reach of informal and traditional social protection mechanisms in Samoa, the frequency and magnitude of exogenous shocks have placed traditional support mechanisms under considerable strain. In addition, rising costs of living and inequality, urbanization, shifts in social norms, the impact of climate change and the COVID-19 pandemic are exerting unprecedented pressure on the effective functioning of traditional social protection mechanisms and exacerbating existing vulnerabilities.
In light of these challenges, it is of vital importance to identify where protection gaps lie for the most marginalized groups as the realities and life cycle vulnerabilities of these groups are neither yet fully captured with disaggregated data nor addressed with targeted policy. To that end, this policy brief assesses how formal social protection policies could complement and strengthen informal and traditional mechanisms, with a focus on issues facing women and youth, persons with disabilities, jobseekers, school dropouts, individuals and households recovering from disasters.</p
Statistical newsletter. No. 61 part two, March 1986
No full textThe Statistical Newsletter is published quarterly by the Statistics Division of the Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (UNESCAP)
Transport and trade in the age of pandemics : implications of the COVID-19 pandemic for commercial contracts covering the transportation of goods in the Asia-Pacific region and beyond
No full textThe "Transport and trade connectivity in the age of pandemics: Contactless, seamless and collaborative UN solutions" project responds to a call to action, for the immediate health response required to suppress transmission of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), to end the pandemic; and to tackle the many social and economic dimensions of this crisis, made in the United Nations (UN) SDG report on "Shared responsibility, global solidarity: Responding to the socio-economic impacts of COVID-19", published in March 2020.
From the transport perspective, COVID-19 not only poses a severe global health threat, it also represents a supply and a demand shock. Different measures were undertaken by countries in Asia and the Pacific region to contain the pandemic pose operational challenges of movement of goods on both national and international level, adversely disrupting international transport connectivity and logistics supply chain network.
The COVID-19 pandemic resulted in an unprecedented shock to the world economy and to individual commercial contractual obligations, including in trade in transportation. A lot of businesses have seen dramatic and sudden changes in demand and revenue and many businesses involved in the manufacture, distribution and transportation of so-called “non-essential” goods have been forced to temporarily close because of government-enforced lockdowns, social distancing regulations, supply chain disruption and/or a collapse in demand. Many trade and transport operators faced the situation when they were not able to duly fulfil their contractual obligations and apparently had to seek for the ways to delay and/or avoid performance of their contractual obligations and/or terminate contracts because COVID-19 has legitimately prevented them from performing their contractual obligations.
With a view to increase awareness of Government officials and transport operators in Asia and the Pacific region on the ways of addressing some of the key legal implications of COVID-19 for commercial contracts covering transport of goods and to assist shippers and consignees, particularly in developing countries in addressing some of the key commercial law implications of the COVID-19 crisis, the UNESCAP secretariat, in the frame of the above-mentioned project, conducted research and preliminary analysis of the challenges arising from the COVID-19 crisis affecting international commercial contracts, including contracts on international carriage of goods by various modes of transport, focusing particularly on land and multimodal transport.
The key findings of this research are summarized in this report outlining analyzing key legal implications of COVID-19 crisis for commercial contracts in the ESCAP region and beyond, identifying critical issues (including applicability of force-majeure clauses). The report also suggests several practical recommendations on contractual policy in the current extra-ordinary and evolving situation that could be used by transport industry stakeholders in their operations to better cope with the emerged challenges.</p
IPR waiver in vaccines and opportunities for India : what does the data show?
No full textIn light of the spread of Covid-19 cases in India during the second wave, the Government of India (GOI) decided to negotiate for an IPR waiver under section 1 (copyright and related rights), 4 (industrial designs), 5 (patents), and 7 (protection of undisclosed information) of TRIPS Agreement under the World Trade Organization (WTO). The expectation of the GOI is that the proposed IPR waiver would allow more firms to come forward to manufacture vaccines, medicines, and other COVID-19 related medical items, which would in turn augment their availability at an affordable price. The current paper concludes that IPR waivers as such are unlikely improve the cheaper access to medicine. Instead, the focus should be on granting of compulsory licenses, reduction of import tariffs and non-tariff measures (NTMs) to reduce prices of COVID-19 medicines, vaccines, and other pharmaceutical items. The analysis with trade data points out India currently lacks a comparative advantage in several categories of active pharmaceutical ingredients, manufacturing medical equipment and devices, disinfectants and sterilisation products, and personal protective equipment. In contrast, it holds a comparative advantage in manufacturing vaccines and formulations. Interestingly, India imposes higher tariffs and NTMs on both sets of products, irrespective of the comparative advantages. The analysis concludes that the focus of the policymakers should be on reduction and elimination of tariffs and NTMs. This will ensure smoother availability of medicinal goods in the domestic market at an affordable price on one hand and augment competitiveness in the world market on the other.</p
The Asian and Pacific Centre for the Development of Disaster Information Management (APDIM) multi-year strategic programme of work 2021-2030
No full textIn response to a request made by APDIM’s 4th Governing Council, this document outlines the vision of the Asian and Pacific Centre for the Development of Disaster Information Management (APDIM) for the 2021-2030 decade and proposes potential deliverables for the Biennium 2021-2022. This Programme of Work aims at positioning APDIM as an important regional centre for disaster information management and risk-informed development. APDIM aspires to do so by becoming a thought leader and go-to repository of information.
Disaster events have been devastating lives, economies, and environments regularly across the globe. The 2019 Asia Pacific Disaster Report developed by the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP) and the Asian and Pacific Centre for the Development of Disaster Information Management (APDIM), shows that the absolute multi-hazard average annual loss (AAL) in US dollars for the region as a whole is a staggering USD 148,866 million which represents 54 per cent of global multi-hazard risk. These estimates refer to direct losses that normally represent only 30 to 40 per cent of total losses, applying this assumption to Asia and the Pacific region, the total average annual loss, including indirect losses, would rise to USD 270,936 million — representing 1 per cent of the region's gross domestic product (GDP). In individual countries, it could be a much higher figure.
With the increased understanding that losses due to disasters undermine the ability of economic growth to reduce poverty and inequality, the need for disaster information management services and technical assistance to the member States is therefore even more relevant. Understanding hazard and risk in all its dimensions is fundamental for designing effective risk reduction measures and development plans that will not only contribute to reducing the existing stock of risk but also prevent the creation of additional risk. In the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction 2015-2030, understanding disaster risk is the priority for action: “policies and practices for disaster risk management should be based on an understanding of disaster risk in all its dimensions of vulnerability, capacity, exposure of persons and assets, hazard characteristics and the environment.”</p
Strengthening the resilience of least developed countries in the wake of the coronavirus disease pandemic
No full textThe year 2020 marked the end of the Fourth United Nations Programme of Action for the Least Developed Countries for the Decade 2011−2020 or informally called the Istanbul Programme of Action. During that year, the world encountered an unprecedented global pandemic which significantly affected the Asia-Pacific least developed countries (LDCs).
The Asia-Pacific Countries with Special Needs Development Report provides a summary of the progress made and challenges encountered by the Asia-Pacific LDCs in implementing the Programme of Action. It also includes an evaluation of the socioeconomic impacts of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic on these countries and offers perspectives on how the pandemic is likely to affect their progress towards graduation from the LDC category and achieving the Sustainable Development Goals by 2030.
The report presents policy areas that should be covered in the next programme of action for LDCs for the next decade to initiate sustained socioeconomic recovery in the aftermath of COVID-19 pandemic and to realize the Sustainable Development Goals. Also, in the report, the importance of regional and subregional cooperation going forward to improve the resilience of these countries in dealing with shocks, such as the COVID-19 pandemic, is reinforced. For graduating countries, continued support from development partners, beyond graduation, is essential to ensure a smooth transition from the category.
Related working papers:
Asia-Pacific Least Developed Countries: A Review of Implementation of the Istanbul Programme of Action and Way Forward
COVID-19 Pandemic and the Asia-Pacific LDCs: Impacts, challenges, gaps and way forward</a