The fifth meeting of the Scientific Committee was held on the 27 – 29 April, 2011 in Paris, France at the ICSU Secretariat.  The meeting included updates from the co-sponsors, development of a sub-committee for the IRDR Conference (which will be held in October 2011), briefings from IRDR National Committees (Canada, Germany, Japan, and New Zealand), reports on the Japan Earthquake and Tsunami as well as the Christchurch (New Zealand) earthquakes, a briefing on the 1^st Meeting of the International Advisory Board of International Centre of Excellence (ICoE) and IRDR-START Cities at Risk Workshop held at the IRDR ICoE. The sixth meeting of the Scientific Committee will be held in Beijing, China October 28-29 and November 3, 2011.