Science and practical disaster risk reduction: Role of universities and academia in disaster risk reduction: – From the discussions at the UNWCDRR public forum by APRU and IRIDeS –

The Association of Pacific Rim Universities (APRU) organized a public forum in March 2015 at the UN World Conference on Disaster Risk Reduction in collaboration with the International Research Institute of Disaster Science (IRIDeS) of Japan. Discussion focused on three topics – bridging the gap between scientific theory and practice, how science and technology could contribute to practical Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR) and the role of social science in DRR. These sessions led to three major recommendations: 1) Enhanced collaboration between the private sector and academia 2) Multisectoral collaboration, including local schools and communities, to make data and technologies useful, usable and accessible 3) Social science elements such as psychology, cultural studies, communication, ethics and history incorporating disaster risk sciences because most current problems involve social rather engineering aspects. Social science potentially balances qualitative and quantitative methods well.