Our History

From 1988 to 2019, the SDR was a subcommittee within the U.S. National Science and Technology Council (NSTC), initially as the Subcommittee for Natural Disaster Reduction, and then after 2002 as the Subcommittee for Disaster Reduction. Under this mandate, the SDR advised the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) and others about relevant risk reduction resources and the related work of SDR Member Agencies. Additional information about our former role as a White House subcommittee is available on the archived site: sdr.gov. From 2019-2022, the SDR continued to meet as a stand-alone federal interagency coordination group.

In April 2022 the SDR rejoined the NSTC as an interagency working group under the Subcommittee for Resilience Science and Technology (SRST). As a SRST interagency working group, the SDR supported the SRST's mission to support to identify and address disaster S&T policy gaps and challenges, informed by Federal disaster-related S&T activities, products, and breakthroughs.

Today, as a voluntary interagency coordination group, we continue to provide a Federal forum for information sharing and collaboration among federal producers and users of disaster science and technology.