The following is a summary of a session at the Emergency Preparedness & Response (EP&R) Learning Academy, which was hosted on April 20 to 24, 2026 by the World Bank Tokyo Disaster Risk Management (DRM) Hub, in partnership with GFDRR, and with financial support from the Government of Japan and the Government of Canada.

Emergencies do not affect everyone equally; women and children are up to 14 times more likely to die in disasters, and persons with disabilities face 4 times the risk. The session titled "Integrating Gender and Social Inclusion in EP&R: Entry Points for Inclusive EP&R Systems" examined how to embed gender and social inclusion across five key entry points in EP&R systems: institutional frameworks, early warning systems, shelter and service delivery, supplies and equipment, and training and knowledge building. Drawing on country examples from the Philippines, Niger, Costa Rica, Pakistan, and Romania, as well as an interactive evacuation simulation, the session demonstrated that inclusive EP&R is not an add-on but a prerequisite for effective response. Integrating disaggregated data, community knowledge, and diverse communication channels leads to stronger systems, better risk understanding, and more resilient outcomes for all.

Key Insights

Reaching the most vulnerable

Zoe Trohanis, Lead DRM Specialist, stressed the importance of ensuring that early warning systems reach the last mile — including the most vulnerable and hardest-to-reach populations. This was shown in Niger, where a national coordination hub and real-time simulation exercises are being deployed to achieve full population coverage of early warning systems by 2027. The example highlighted that the effectiveness of a warning depends not just on its transmission, but on whether it reaches every community member in a form they can understand and act upon.

The importance of community engagement

The session's interactive evacuation exercise drove home the importance of recognizing that different groups have vastly different abilities to receive, interpret, and act on emergency warnings. Participants simulated an evacuation of the room to the nearest local shelter, which surfaced immediate challenges: individuals with mobility limitations, sensory impairments, or other constraints faced barriers that others did not — revealing how a single, undifferentiated warning or evacuation plan can leave entire groups behind. The group collectively problem-solved in real time, demonstrating that inclusive response requires active community engagement. Communities are best positioned to know who among them may need extra assistance, to ensure warnings are communicated in accessible formats, and to provide direct support to those who cannot act independently — making community engagement not a complement to EP&R systems, but a core component of them.

Next Steps

Effective EP&R systems must account for the full range of community capacities, as a warning is only as good as a person's ability to receive, interpret, and act on it, as brought home by the session's evacuation simulation. Communities play a critical role in identifying and supporting those with differentiated needs. Next steps include strengthening community-based early warning networks, improving the accessibility of warning messaging, training first responders on disability and gender inclusion, and ensuring shelters and other emergency facilities and supplies factor into account the needs of different social groups.