Date: 29/07/2025
Time: 09:00 – 10:00 (BST)
Location: Online
Post-disaster shelter recovery in the Asia-Pacific region
In this webinar, Commonwealth Alumnus, Iftekhar Ahmed will discuss his research and professional experience in recovery of shelter after disasters in the Asia-Pacific region.
Asia is the most disaster-affected continent and the small island countries of the Pacific face serious risk and impacts of disasters and climate change. Shelter is often the most affected sector in disasters, and there are many efforts around the world by humanitarian agencies and other stakeholders to support the post-disaster shelter recovery process. Typically, agencies support the recovery through three key stages: temporary shelter, transitional shelter and permanent housing. For permanent housing, different modalities follow including owner-driven, community-driven and agency-driven, or a hybrid approach. Each of these modalities have their advantages and disadvantages. Some selected case studies allow illustrating these aspects of shelter recovery. Dr Ahmed stresses the importance of the necessity of ‘building-back-better’ so that communities are more resilient to future disasters.
Shelter relates to global frameworks including the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction (SFDRR) and Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). During this webinar, Dr Ahmed will highlight Priority 4 of the SFDRR which specifically espouses ‘building-back-better’. Beyond post-disaster shelter recovery, a significant proportion of the people in the world live in inadequate and vulnerable shelter, and the impact of disasters for them is severe. Investing in safe shelter as a sustainable development activity is an imperative to achieve disaster resilience, and such anticipatory action can reduce the pressures for undertaking post-disaster shelter recovery interventions.
This webinar will address the CSC development theme, Strengthening resilience and response to crisis.
The CSC’s Development in Action webinar series provides an opportunity for Commonwealth Scholars and Alumni to present on their work and contribution to development across a range of contemporary global challenges and provide insight into ongoing research and action.
Open to all Commonwealth Scholars and Alumni, the monthly webinars will address one of the CSC’s six development themes and provide an opportunity for attendees to engage in real-time Q&A discussion on the topic presented.
You can watch previous webinars on the CSC’s YouTube channel.
Dr Iftekhar Ahmed is an Associate Professor and Program Convenor of the Master of Disaster Risk and Resilience, University of Newcastle, Australia. His expertise lies in disaster risk and resilience principles, resilience of the built environment and construction management research. His research interests include post-disaster housing, disaster risk reduction, climate change adaptation and urbanisation in the Asia-Pacific.
Dr Ahmed has written several books and many peer-reviewed publications and engages in various research and evaluation projects relating to disaster resilience. He is the lead author of the book ‘Disaster Resilience in South Asia: Tackling the Odds in the Sub-Continental Fringes’ (Routledge, UK, 2020).
Dr Iftekhar Ahmed is a 1995 Commonwealth Scholar from Bangladesh. He completed his PhD in Architecture (Housing) from Oxford Brookes University.
