The 15th International Conference of the Integrated Disaster Risk Management (IDRiM) Society (IDRiM2025), titled “Advancing disaster risk reduction in islands and remote areas”, highlights the distinct risk environments and multifaceted challenges faced by islands and remote areas. In this context, the conference places accessibility (physical, social, economic, institutional, etc.) at the center examining its impact on disaster prevention and mitigation, emergency response, and disaster recovery in the era of climate crisis and globalization.
Remote areas—such as islands, peninsulas, rural and forest communities, and mountainous regions—often face geographic isolation, limited infrastructure, and fragile ecosystems. These conditions create challenges for disaster risk reduction, including poor access to resources, weak emergency systems, and fragmented governance. Climate change and globalization further heighten vulnerabilities, underscoring the need for adaptive, sustainable, and locally tailored solutions.
Addressing disaster risks in these complex, resource-limited settings reveals critical implementation gaps. Implementation science plays a key role in bridging these gaps by aligning research, policy, and practice to develop context-specific, collaborative solutions. It helps identify barriers, craft practical strategies, and promote iterative learning. This approach supports integrated disaster risk management in places with limited or intermittent access to infrastructure, services, resources, and information—an urgent focus for researchers, policymakers, and practitioners alike.
To this end, IDRiM2025 encompasses the following topics, preferably focusing on islands and remote areas although other contributions, for example concerning urban areas, will be also considered.
Understanding disaster risk
- (Disaster) Risk assessment at a local level considering global flows and trends
- Frameworks to bridge knowledge and practice, fostering collaborative approaches to risk assessment
- Coastal and mountain hazards and risks in the era of climate change
- All-of-society engagement and participation for better risk and disaster data
- Citizen science for disaster risk reduction
- Sharing risk knowledge amongst different geo-administrative levels, sectors, communities, and scientific fields
- Spatial and temporal dimensions of hazard, exposure, vulnerability and disaster risk
- Comparing disaster response and recovery capacities in remote vs. non-remote areas
Strengthening disaster risk governance towards reducing and managing disaster risk in islands and remote areas
- All-of-society disaster risk reduction and management
- Risk awareness, information and communication leaving no one behind
- Capacity-building for participatory and risk-informed decision-making
- Science-policy-practice-community collaboration in disaster reduction and management
- Developing capacities and knowledge towards a resilient future
- Policies for enhancing individual, community and institutional disaster resilience and climate change adaptation
- Risk governance structures that integrate implementation science to enhance cross-sectoral collaboration and coordination
Investing in disaster risk reduction and resilience in islands and remote areas
- Sustainable and resilient infrastructure, tools and systems to improve accessibility
- Incentivizing private sector investment and engagement in disaster risk reduction
- Innovative investments and financing mechanisms for islands and remote areas
- Mainstreaming disaster risk reduction towards local development
- Risk informed investment in islands and remote areas, focusing on health, transport and tourism
- Investing in Nature based Solutions for disaster risk reduction and climate change adaptation
- Comparing approaches to infrastructure resilience in remote and non-remote areas
Improving disaster preparedness and response – “Build Back Better”
- Multi-Hazard early warning systems considering local priorities and challenges
- Emergency evacuation and relocation through the lens of sustainable development
- Information and Communication Systems for crisis and disaster management
- Disaster recovery and reconstruction of historic / traditional settlements and areas
- Build Back Better from disaster
- Inclusive preparedness, response, recovery and reconstruction
- Leveraging resilience to hazards and sustainability through disaster reconstruction
- Learning from disasters
- Embedding adaptive processes in disaster preparedness and emergency response efforts
The IDRiM Society and IIASA
The IDRiM Society and its Journal (IDRiM Journal) were officially launched on October 15, 2009 in Kyoto, Japan, at the 9th IIASA-DPRI Forum on Integrated Disaster Risk Management (IDRiM Forum). The formation of the IDRiM Society was based on a long history of collaboration between the Disaster Prevention Research Institute (DPRI) of Kyoto University and IIASA. The decision to set up the IDRiM Society was based on the success of a series of nine IIASA-DPRI Forums on Integrated Disaster Risk Management organised by DPRI and IIASA.
The founding members of the IDRiM Society include Dr. Joanne Bayer (IIASA), Dr. Reinhard Mechler (IIASA), Prof. Norio Okada (DPRI), Dr. Aniello Amendola (IIASA), Dr. Peijun Shi (Beijing Normal University), Prof. Hirokazu Tatano (DPRI), Dr. Mohsen Ghafory-Ashtiani (International Institute of Earthquake Engineering and Seismology), and Dr. Ana Maria Cruz (DPRI).
Japan is one of the founding members of IIASA and research collaborations between IIASA and Japan have been highly productive since the Institute was founded in 1972.
Upcoming Events
Matosinhos, a neighboring municipality of Porto, Greater Porto Metropolitan Area (Portugal)
CircEUlar featured in a Carbon Neutrality Exhibition in Portugal
Laxenburg, Austria and online
IIASA Resilience Hub Series: Communicating resilience: Visualization, virtual/augmented reality, serious games, and AI
Austrian Academy of Sciences
Partnering for progress: Strengthening science and policy through multilateral collaboration for tomorrow
Conference Center, Laxenburg, Austria
IIASA to Host the First-Ever Climate Overshoot Conference from September 30th to October 2nd, 2025
International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA), Laxenburg, Austria