Disaster risk reduction
Hyogo Framework for Action
Definition
The Hyogo Framework for Action 2005–2015: Building the Resilience of Nations and Communities to Disasters was the ten-year global plan for disaster risk reduction adopted by 168 UN member states at the 2005 World Conference on Disaster Reduction in Kobe, Japan. Its overarching goal was the substantial reduction of disaster losses — in lives and in social, economic, and environmental assets — through five priorities for action, and it was succeeded in 2015 by the Sendai Framework.
References
Supports definition and framing.
Overview
What it means
The HFA marked the shift from responding to disasters toward reducing their underlying risk: it made risk assessment, early warning, risk knowledge, and preparedness mainstream policy vocabulary, and it created the monitoring habits (national progress reporting, terminology standards) on which Sendai built.
Its weakness — limited accountability and implementation gaps — directly shaped Sendai's targets and indicators.
How it is used
The framework is cited in DRR historiography, national platform design, and evaluations of pre-2015 resilience policy; its terminology legacy persists via UNDRR.
Why it matters
Understanding Sendai — and thus current resilience policy — requires knowing the framework it corrected and extended.