New York and Bangkok, 22 October 2026 – Investments in trusted institutions, AI and digital safeguards, public health protections and disaster preparedness should be treated as essential security investments as interconnected shocks place growing pressure on the safety and well-being of people across Asia and the Pacific, according to a new UNDP report released today. The report proposes four “development circuit breakers” – systems and institutions that help countries absorb big shocks and stop the disruption from cascading into wider instability.The report, Redefining Security: Development Circuit Breakers for a More Secure Future, finds that many of the region’s greatest security risks now emerge through climate shocks, economic insecurity, cybercrimes, declining trust in institutions and transnational illicit trade networks, rather than through traditional military threats alone. Spanning a vast geography from Iran and Afghanistan to the Pacific Islands, the report warns that governments are increasingly confronting overlapping crises that drive each other, leaving many countries trapped in a cycle of responding to emergencies instead of preventing them. Addressing what is increasingly the endemic nature of compounding destructive forces requires a different approach.Global military expenditure reached nearly US$2.9 trillion in 2025, while official development assistance fell by close to 23 percent to US$174.3 billion, the largest annual decline on record. The report warns that resources, capabilities and systems to improve prevention and resilience, and longer-term human development, are being squeezed precisely as interconnected risks become more costly to manage. The report argues that the growing gap between spending on deterrence and spending on prevention risks making societies more vulnerable to future crises. “For many people, insecurity starts with a lost job, a bill they cannot pay, an online scam or a public service they can no longer rely on,” said Alexander De Croo, UNDP Administrator. “Add a climate disaster, and these pressures quickly reinforce one another, stretching families, institutions and national budgets to breaking point. Investing in development helps stop that spiral before it starts. Development is prevention. And prevention is the smartest security investment we can make.”The report highlights how security risks increasingly move across borders through digital networks, supply chains, financial systems and shared environmental assets. Online scam economies generated an estimated US$1.03 trillion globally, with losses to victims across Asia and the Pacific estimated up to US$114.1 billion in 2025 alone. The report also highlights the vulnerability of the region’s 1.3 billion informal workers, many of whom lack meaningful social protection, savings or insurance. Asia and the Pacific is also home to 70 percent of people affected by disasters globally.Rather than treating these issues separately, the report argues they act like accelerants, reinforcing one another, creating a growing vortex of insecurity that traditional security approaches and instruments alone cannot address. Drawing on examples, the report highlights how stronger local governance, social protection systems, digital safeguards, early warning systems and community trust-building and resilience initiatives have reduced risks and strengthened a sense of security. The report also makes a strong economic case for prevention. Every dollar invested in disaster resilience can save between four and seven dollars in response costs, while broader investments in prevention can generate returns of up to US$103 for every dollar invested through avoided crisis and recovery costs. “For too long, development and security have been treated as separate conversations, and as distinctly separate outcomes,” said Kanni Wignaraja, UN Assistant Secretary-General and UNDP Regional Director for Asia and the Pacific. “This analysis shows they are deeply interconnected. And this is where the investments from development and security sectors can come together behind shared outcomes, and hopefully, results in a peace and a safety that people can feel.” As climate impacts intensify, digital risks accelerate and economic uncertainty increases across the region, the report concludes that the most effective path to lasting security lies in investments that reduce vulnerabilities well before they become crises. This raises important questions about what prevention strategies should include and how to make prevention more politically visible and fiscally viable as the right choice.The report stresses that its recommendations are not a call for the securitization of development nor an argument against necessary defense investments. Instead, it argues for a broader understanding of security that centers on people’s well-being and the intensifying vulnerabilities they face as its gravitational pull to define the changes needed to both security and development strategy. “A secure future in Asia and the Pacific will be measured not only by the threats deterred, but by whether people can live with dignity, access opportunity and have confidence in the future,” Wignaraja said. “Trust is the force multiplier that connects all of this and provides that exponential return to better connected security and development outcomes.” Media contact: rbap.media@undp.org.
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