Ioana Creitaru

Ioana Creitaru

Dr Ioana Creitaru is Preparedness and Early Warning Specialist at UNDP’s Crisis Bureau/ Disaster Risk Reduction & Recovery for Building Resilience Team based in Geneva. With over 17 years of experience in the United Nations System in Geneva and in the field, as well as in the non-governmental sector, Ioana has advised leaders and teams of over 40 governments and UN Country Teams to strengthen climate and disaster risk governance. Dr Creitaru is currently leading UNDP’s global portfolio on disaster early warning and preparedness, spearheading the UNDP Preparedness Learning Pathway, a pioneering initiative to boost countries’ preparedness and anticipatory capabilities. She serves as the UNDP global manager of a flagship public-private partnership between UNDP and DHL Group that has enhanced airport disaster readiness capabilities in 30+ countries since 2009. Dr Creitaru is passionate advocate for disability inclusion, having led UNDP’s global policy on disability-inclusive disaster risk reduction, and a Gender Equality Champion at UNDP. Dr Creitaru is an active UNDP SURGE Advisor with a wealth of country experience spanning all geographical regions of the world, having been deployed to support UNDP’s response and recovery efforts in Afghanistan (Eastern Afghanistan earthquakes of 31 August 2025), Egypt (Gaza crisis response in 2024), Papua New Guinea (landslides of May 2024), Syria (earthquakes of February 2023), Moldova (Ukraine refugee crisis in 2022) and India (COVID-19 pandemic in 2021). Dr Creitaru holds a PhD degree awarded in 2015 for research on securitization, climate change and disaster response from the Geneva Graduate Institute, Switzerland.

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  • Organization
    UNDP
  • Profession
    Global Preparedness Lead
Related sessions
In person
7 July 2026
14:00 - 17:15
EST - New York
CST - Beijing
PST - Los Angeles
AWST - Perth, Australia

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