Summary record of the seventh session of the Resilience Council

Sittings: Asia-Pacific, 06:00 UTC; Europe/Africa/Americas, 16:00 UTC

Attendance: The Resilience Council comprised 111 members from 45 countries at the date of this record. The consolidated record does not disaggregate attendance between the two sittings; the council membership figures are therefore reported as the constituency represented, not as separate sitting check-in totals.

Agenda

1. Opening remarks and confirmation of the session’s purpose.
2. Review of the evidence and five-part pattern test for RS-001: Volume, Frequency, Consistency, Spread and Corroboration.
3. Discussion of reported business interruption, insurance decisions, bridge funding and continuity planning.
4. Consideration of the Reopen Map and typhoon and flood readiness activity as evidence-gathering tools.
5. Decisions, action items and the next session.

Summary of proceedings

1. The Chair opened both sittings and stated that the Council was reviewing the evidence for RS-001, the proposed Reopen Standard. He recalled that the agenda item concerned three practical requests: insurance claims to be decided within 30 days, bridge funding to be made available within 10 days of a declared disaster, and continuity-planning support appropriate to micro businesses. He emphasized that the session was an evidence and pattern-review meeting. It was not a ballot on a standard, and it would not determine any individual insurance claim or funding application.

2. The Chair reported the Council’s current status as four of the five pattern tests passed, with corroboration pending. He asked participants to keep the distinction between reported experience and verified evidence clear. Members could describe their own circumstances anonymously, but should not name their businesses or identify a company as responsible for an alleged practice. Any descriptions of counterparties were to remain general, such as “an insurer,” “a lender,” or “a national disaster agency.”

3. In the Asia-Pacific sitting, the Chair introduced the evidence assembled to date. The Council had 161 reports about disaster situations, filed by members in 43 countries, as recorded in the internal data available on 20 August. The median amount at stake was approximately US$4,903. He noted that those figures described the evidence received and did not, by themselves, establish a representative rate of loss or a finding against any provider. The Council also had 111 members from 45 countries. The figures were presented to help participants assess the reach and limits of the record, not to imply that every member had filed a report.

4. Marites Abellanosa of Tacloban, Philippines, described the difficulty of separating the time needed to repair a workplace from the time needed to regain access to working capital. She said that owners may be able to identify an immediate need for stock, equipment or temporary premises while still waiting for an insurance decision. She encouraged the Council to record the dates of distinct steps—loss, claim submission, requests for further information, decision and payment—rather than treating them as one interval. The Chair noted that this distinction was relevant to testing a 30-day decision period against actual reported processes.

5. Haruto Sato of Miyazaki, Japan, said continuity planning should be usable by owners who have limited staff and little time away from daily operations. He supported collecting cases of short, practical plans, including how essential records are kept accessible and how suppliers or customers are notified when normal operations are interrupted. He cautioned that a plan on paper does not establish that a business has the people, money or access needed to carry it out. The Chair recorded that point as relevant to the proposed continuity-planning support element, while noting that the Council had not yet drafted a fix.

6. Amara Okafor of Lagos, Nigeria, asked that reports distinguish between a request for assistance and the date assistance became usable. In her view, a bridge-funding commitment would not meet the proposed purpose if the money remained unavailable during the period when a business needed to reopen. She recommended that evidence forms ask whether support was offered, approved, disbursed and accessible, and record the relevant dates where a member could provide them. Participants agreed that those distinctions could help the Council evaluate the proposed 10-day period without presuming that every reported delay had the same cause.

7. In the Europe/Africa/Americas sitting, Lucía Benítez of Valparaíso, Chile, discussed how a disruption can affect the ability to submit a complete claim. She said that records may be damaged or inaccessible, and that an owner may need to prioritize immediate safety and continuity over administrative steps. She asked that evidence collection avoid treating incomplete documentation as proof that no loss occurred. The Chair said that this was a useful caution for the corroboration stage: the Council should seek supporting material where possible, but its method should also record why material may be unavailable and should not make a member’s account disappear solely because records were lost.

8. Ousmane Diop of Dakar, Senegal, supported a consistent way to record whether a reported event involved a declared disaster, a local disruption, or another interruption. He said that the label applied to an event could affect whether an owner was able to seek assistance, and recommended keeping the member’s own description alongside any formal designation. The Chair observed that the proposed bridge-funding trigger referred to a declared disaster, while the Council’s evidence-gathering should still preserve reports about disruptions that did not fit that trigger. No change to the wording of RS-001 was adopted at this session.

9. Elena Marković of Split, Croatia, asked the Council to examine the sequence between a formal decision and practical reopening. She said that an owner can receive a decision and still face delays in obtaining funds, replacement equipment or access to a usable location. She recommended that reports record days to reopen as a distinct outcome, where the member could estimate or document it, rather than using approval or payment as a substitute. The Chair noted that the Council had offered days-to-reopen data to UNDRR as a contribution to the Sendai Framework review in its 18 May letter. The present session would continue the Council’s own evidence review and did not presume that an external body had accepted or acted on that offer.

10. Carla Reyes of Cebu City, Philippines, described the value and limits of the Reopen Map and the typhoon and flood readiness drive. She supported using the map to identify where members had experienced disruption and to invite further reports, but cautioned that a map entry should not be treated as independent confirmation of a claim. She recommended that any public-facing presentation explain what the map records, what it does not verify, and how a member can submit additional evidence without disclosing a business identity. The Chair agreed that the map was an evidence-gathering and communication tool, not a substitute for corroboration.

11. In the Europe/Africa/Americas sitting, Mateo Castillo of San Juan, Puerto Rico, said that the proposed 30-day insurance decision period should be assessed carefully against the practical meaning of “decision.” He recommended that evidence distinguish an acknowledgement, a request for more information, a partial determination and a final decision. He also asked that the Council not assume that a decision within 30 days would necessarily result in a prompt payment. The Chair noted that the proposed request concerned the time to decide a claim and that payment timing could be recorded separately in the evidence. Members did not recommend replacing one measure with the other.

12. Priya Nair of Kochi, India, supported a common reporting structure across the two sittings. She said that a comparable record should capture the type of interruption, the time taken at each relevant step, the amount at stake if known, and whether the owner had continuity support. She asked that optional fields remain clearly optional where a member could not safely or reasonably supply details. The Chair said that the Secretariat would be asked to review the evidence form for these distinctions and to preserve the Council’s anonymity safeguards.

13. Several members in both sittings returned to the issue of corroboration. Participants identified potentially useful supporting material, including dated correspondence, claim or funding records, public disaster notices and a member’s contemporaneous notes. They recognized that these materials would not be available in every case and that one document might establish a date without establishing the whole account. The Chair asked members to submit evidence only where they were entitled to share it and to remove personal or commercially sensitive details that were not needed for the Council’s review. No individual report was adjudicated during the session.

14. The Council considered the wider resilience context. The Chair referred to UNDRR’s account that small and medium-sized enterprises bear approximately 75 per cent of business disaster losses, and to its statement that disaster risk reduction can reduce losses by up to one third.¹ He also referred to the Sendai Framework’s emphasis on integrating business continuity into business practice, particularly for micro, small and medium-sized enterprises. Members treated these points as context for the Council’s work, not as proof that any specific proposed deadline was already established by international practice. The Chair further noted the reported Japan METI survey finding, reproduced in a UNDRR resilience report, that 8 per cent of prepared SMEs had not recovered sales compared with 19 per cent of unprepared SMEs.² Participants agreed that this evidence supported attention to preparedness but did not settle the design of a continuity-support measure.

15. In closing discussion, the Chair asked whether the Council had sufficient corroboration to move directly to a draft fix. Members considered that the evidence established a substantial body of reports and clear questions for further review, but that corroboration remained incomplete. Participants supported continuing the evidence stage, improving the record of timelines and outcomes, and testing the limits of available supporting material. The Chair confirmed that no draft fix would be put forward as adopted policy at this meeting. Once the fifth test was completed, the Council could consider whether to prepare a draft and, if so, submit it to public consultation under the Assembly process.

Decisions

1. The Council received the evidence review and confirmed that RS-001 remained at four of five pattern tests passed, with Corroboration pending as of 20 August 2026.

2. The Council agreed to continue corroboration before moving to a draft fix. The evidence review would distinguish reported experience from supporting material and would not treat the absence of a document as proof that an account was false.

3. The Council agreed that further evidence collection should, where available, distinguish claim submission, requests for information, decision, approval, disbursement and access to funds. It should also distinguish days to reopen from the time to a decision or payment.

4. The Council confirmed that the Reopen Map and readiness activity could support outreach and evidence collection, but would not be described as independent verification of each report.

5. The Council made no determination on an individual report, adopted no RS-001 standard, and did not authorize letters to CEOs or other recipients. Those steps were not before the Council at this stage.

Action items

Next session

The Council agreed to hold its eighth session on 17 September 2026 in two Open Table sittings: Asia-Pacific at 06:00 UTC and Europe/Africa/Americas at 16:00 UTC. The proposed agenda would include a report on the actions above, a review of any additional corroborating material, and a decision on whether the evidence was sufficient to complete the pattern test and proceed to drafting.

Certification

Sources

1. UNDRR, “Supporting disaster risk reduction and resilience practices for small and medium-sized enterprises.”¹

2. UNDRR, “Resilience of SMEs” report, including the Japan METI survey finding.²

Notes and sources

Sources

1. UNDRR, Supporting disaster risk reduction and resilience practices for small and medium-sized enterprises
2. UNDRR, Resilience of SMEs report