UNESCO Chair in DRR-RE supports AIWEST-DR 2025 hosted at UCL

20–22 August 2025 — UCL, London. The UNESCO Chair in Disaster Risk Reduction and Resilience Engineering (DRR-RE) at UCL supported the successful delivery of the 17th Aceh International Workshop and Expo on Sustainable Disaster Recovery (AIWEST-DR), hosted on UCL’s Bloomsbury campus and UCL East from 20 to 22 August. The hybrid conference brought together more than 100 attendees from academia, government, and industry to share advances in disaster risk reduction and recovery.

Under the 2025 theme “Global Partnerships Toward Future Disaster Resilience,” the UNESCO Chair team helped convene sessions, coordinate hybrid participation, and facilitate knowledge exchange across disciplines—strengthening links between researchers and practitioners working on earthquakes, tsunamis, floods, and multi-hazard risk.

AIWEST-DR 2025 was organised by an international consortium of universities from Indonesia, Thailand, Japan, Australia, and the UK, with presentations delivered in person at UCL and online to enable global access. The UNESCO Chair’s support aligns with its mission to co-create a common culture of resilience and to advance methods that protect learning environments and critical infrastructure in hazard-prone regions.

About AIWEST-DR

Founded in Aceh in the aftermath of the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami, AIWEST-DR is a long-running international forum for disaster risk reduction and sustainable recovery. The 17th edition took place at UCL, London, on 20–22 August 2025, with hybrid participation.

Below are some pictures of the conference: