Panel discussion on women's leadership issues and challenges was held as a part of the national workshop.

Asian Disaster Preparedness Center (ADPC) co-organized a national workshop on women's leadership in humanitarian action and disaster risk reduction with the Women Humanitarian and Disaster Risk Reduction Platform (WHDRRP) on 31 March 2022. The workshop highlighted WHDRRP’s learning from the federal and province-level platform’s challenges, opportunities, and ways forward to foster women’s leadership in humanitarian action, climate change adaptation (CCA), and disaster risk reduction (DRR).

Chief Guest, Mr. Anil Pokhrel, CEO, National Disaster Risk Reduction Management Authority (NDRRMA), delivering his key remarks.

Mr. Anil Pokhrel, CEO of the National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Authority (NDRRMA), Government of Nepal, was Chief Guest and stated the need for Gender Equality and Social Inclusion (GESI) approaches in DRRM interventions and strategies.

'The NDRRMA is developing the GESI strategies and will also conduct consultations with women professionals, networks to include their voice and feedback,' he added.

The panel discussion on 'Women leadership in Humanitarian Action and DRR- Addressing the Issues and Challenges' focused on localization and promoting women-led organizations and women leadership in DRRM/CCA, as well as the importance of ensuring the inclusiveness of vulnerable groups in program design and implementation.

Panelists included Mr. Dinesh Gurung, Association of International NGOs (AIN) representative, Mr. Hari Karki, Humanitarian Coordinator, United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) Nepal, Ms. Munaka Neupane, Program Director, Project Bank and DRR Section, National Planning Commission (NPC), Ms. Sharu Joshi Shrestha, from the Nepal Policy Institute (NPI) and Inter-Generational Feminist Forum (IGFF), and Dr. Dijen Bhattarai, NDRRMA, who highlighted the importance of women's role in sustainable DRR and CCA in Nepal.

Mr. Israel Jegillos, Senior Project Manager, ADPC, delivering closing remarks

Mr. Israel Jegillos, Senior Program Manager at ADPC, stressed the need to integrate gender equality and rights-based approaches in different phases and processes of DRR and CCA, and further highlighted the BRDR project and its objectives.

Mr. Rishi Raj Acharya, Under Secretary, Ministry of Federal Affairs and General Administration (MoFAGA), Government of Nepal highlighted the ministry’s initiatives to localize DRRM and stressed the idea of the need for WHDRRP at the local levels to bring forth the concerns of women from the community and inter-link it with the provincial and federal level networks.

Mr. Acharya also highlighted the contribution of ADPC to integrating gender equality and rights-based approaches (GE/RBA) in the Local Disaster and Climate Resilient Plan (LDCRP) and also requested ADPC to help to integrate GE/RBA approaches in other plans.

WHDRRP representatives also shared key achievements of the platform such as ensuring women's representation in DRR committees in Madhesh Province and Bagmati Province.

WHDRRP is a national platform for women professionals working in humanitarian response, climate change adaptation (CCA), and disaster risk reduction (DRR), and advocates to foster women's leadership in CCA, and DRR. About 100 women professionals are affiliated as members of the platform and have established the provincial-level platforms in Sudurpaschim (Far West), Madhesh, and Bagmati Provinces of Nepal.

The workshop was organized under ADPC's Building Resilience through Inclusive and Climate adaptive Disaster Risk Reduction in Asia-Pacific (BRDR) program supported by Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (Sida).