Natural disasters in China: 1900–2011

China is a country prone to high frequency of natural catastrophic events. According to the natural disaster data from 1900 to 2011, the major disaster types include drought, earthquake, epidemic, extreme temperature, flood, mass movement wet and storm. The occurrence of natural disaster and economic loss is increased during the studied period. However, the death toll induced by natural disaster is decreased significantly. A new frame of social development and natural disaster is proposed to discuss the impact of population and GDP on the influence of disaster through the recording and reduction efforts. The results indicated that economic development contributes to the reduction in the impact of natural disaster on the people lives and society. New comprehensive integrated management, including international cooperation, should be established.

     

The ecology of hazardousness,the experience of South America

In many parts of South America, the socio-economic condition of the population is such that in many respects the people, because of their vulnerable state, are a disaster waiting to occur. The triggering action of the disaster will be an extreme physical or biophysical event. If any advance is to be made in natural hazard management, then the focus must be upon people first. Halt the process of underdevelopment in South American societies and you have taken a major step forward in natural hazard management. The major concern of this paper is not so much with the competition for first place in hazard proneness in South America, but rather the elaboration of the total ecology of what we commonly designate as disasters, which ordinarily occur at the interface of extreme natural phenomena and vulnerable settlement patterns, and which should be seen, as the extreme situation which is implicit in the everyday condition of the population. Vulnerability is the key concept in this relationship. South American nations vary greatly in their hazard proneness, in the vulnerability of sectors in their societies, in the losses and general repercussions of hazardous events, and in their ability to cope effectively with the post-disaster situation, either alone or with international aid.     

极端地质灾害与风险

极端地质灾害与风险是本文提出的一个概念.在地球演进过程中,极端地质灾害被认为是小概率事件.但这并不意味这种小概率的自然灾害只发生在遥远的未来,也不能排除这种事件发生在我们现在或者未来不久几代人中间.2008年汶川8.0级强震,吞噬了数万人的生命,大量的建筑被损毁,就是这种极端自然灾害的典型实例.它再一次向人类发出警告,...     

Typhoon disaster in China: prediction,prevention, and mitigation

Typhoon-induced disaster is one of the most important factors influencing the economic development and more than 250 million in China. In view of the existing state of typhoon disaster prediction, prevention, and mitigation, this paper proposes a new probability model, Multivariate Compound Extreme Value Distribution (MCEVD), to predict typhoon-induced extreme disaster events. This model establishes prevention criteria for coastal areas, offshore structures, and estuarine cities, and provides an appropriate mitigation scheme for disaster risk management and decision-making.     

Source inversion and numerical simulation of 2017 <Emphasis Type="Italic">M</Emphasis><Subscript>w</Subscript> 8.1 Mexico earthquake tsunami

Post-disaster social recovery remains the least understood of the disaster phases despite increased risks of extreme events leading to disasters due to climate change. This paper contributes to advance this knowledge by focusing on the disaster recovery process of the Australian coastal town of Cardwell which was affected by category 4/5 Tropical Cyclone Yasi in 2011. Drawing on empirical data collected through semi-structured interviews with Cardwell residents post-Yasi, it examines issues related to social recovery in the first year of the disaster and 2 years later. Key findings discuss the role played by community members, volunteers and state actors in Cardwell’s post-disaster social recovery, especially with respect to how current disaster risk management trends based on self-reliance and shared responsibility unfolded in the recovery phase. Lessons learnt concerning disaster recovery governance are then extracted to inform policy implementation for disaster risk management to support social recovery and enhance disaster resilience in the light of climate change.     

Environmental disasters in social context: toward a preventive and precautionary approach

The paper examines relations between natural hazards and social conditions in disaster, and problems of their integration in disaster management. This must be done against a background of ever-increasing numbers of disasters. The initiating roles and impacts of environmental hazards are acknowledged. However, expanding losses are not explained by increased geophysical risks. To the extent that scientific knowledge or engineering and planning skills are involved, the problems seem more one of (in)effective deployment than major deficiencies. Social analyses suggest the scope of today’s disasters follows primarily from greater concentrations of vulnerable people, exposed in dangerous situations, and lacking adequate protections. Firstly, the question of disaster causality is revisited as a problem of damage diagnostics. A basis is developed from the findings of formal disaster inquiries. Despite their limitations, well-conducted inquiries offer unusually comprehensive anatomies of the social and physical conditions of disasters. They demonstrate and trace out the interplay of environmental, societal, technological, and institutional components of emergencies. In the examples described, environmental hazards are investigated in great detail. Nevertheless, societal preconditions are shown to be more critical. Inadequacies in emergency preparedness, performance, and post-disaster response are highlighted, and for those most at risk. The conclusions present major challenges for the agent-specific view of disasters, and for disaster management preoccupied with natural forces, uncertainty, and emergency responses. Rather, a view of disaster causality emerges emphasizing avoidable failures of preventive, protective, and intervention measures. Evidence is cited to show this is increasingly relevant in so-called natural disasters lacking such inquiries. The discussion considers the relevance of a preventive and precautionary approach in this context. The histories of accident, disease, fire, and crime prevention support arguments for greater attention to context-specific environmental and societal aspects of risk. Aligning disaster management more closely with preventive priorities depends upon a much greater focus on people, places, and livelihoods most at risk, reversing the social processes that put them at risk. It requires listening to their voices and concerns, recognizing and bolstering their resilience. Much more can and should be done to disseminate the protections, from building regulations to insurance, that actually do save so many others in the disasters that happen. As such, the case for greater attention to issues of governance and social justice is strengthened.     

Characterizing the spatial distribution of typical natural disaster vulnerability in China from 2010 to 2017

Natural disaster vulnerability can intuitively reflect the susceptibility of an area to environmental changes. Better understanding the spatial distribution of natural disaster vulnerability is a critical process for taking effective adaptation and management. Although significant achievements have been made in disaster vulnerability, few studies are known about natural disaster vulnerability at the national scale, especially from the typical natural disaster events in China. In this study, with normalizing selected indicators and calculating vulnerability index, we analyzed the spatial distribution of natural disasters vulnerability during 2010–2017 using the geospatial techniques. The results showed that natural disaster vulnerability has certain spatial differences, but different natural disaster can occur in the same area during the study period. Drought disaster can occur in all regions of China, especially in Inner Mongolia. Flood disaster is mainly concentrated in the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River and the Yellow River Basin. The wind and storm disaster is chiefly in the northern regions in China. The freezing disaster is widely distributed in China. Furthermore, the regions with low vulnerability were primarily distributed in the eastern coastal region, indicating that the rapid development of economy and technology can resist or mitigate natural disaster to a certain extent. This study offers a solution to study natural disasters and provides scientific basis for disaster prevention and mitigation actions.

     

The hazard exposure of the Maltese Islands

International comparisons of disaster risk frequently classify Malta as being one of the least hazard exposed countries. Such rankings may be criticised because: (1) they fail to take into account historic increases in population and its seasonal variation; (2) they are based on inadequately researched and incomplete historical catalogues of damaging events; and (3), for small island states like Malta, they do not take into account the implications of restricted land area, which can be disproportionately impacted by even small hazardous events. In this paper, we draw upon a variety of data to discuss disaster risk in the Maltese Islands. In particular, the notion that Malta is one of the ‘safest places on earth’ is not only misleading, but also potentially dangerous because it engenders a false sense of security amongst the population. We argue that Malta is exposed to a variety of extreme events, which include: the distal effects of major earthquakes originating in southern Italy and Greece, plus their associated tsunamis; major ash producing eruptions of Mount Etna (Sicily) and their putative impacts on air transport; storm waves; coastal/inland landslides; karstic collapse; flooding and drought. In criticising international rankings of the islands’ exposure, we highlight the issues involved in formulating hazard assessments, in particular incomplete catalogues of extreme natural events. With Malta witnessing swelling resident, seasonal (i.e. tourist) plus foreign-born populations and increases in the urban area, further research into hazards is required in order to develop evidence-based policies of disaster risk reduction (DRR).     

Prediction and management of extreme events based on a simple probabalistic model of the first-passage boundary

Analogy between the transitions of a dynamical system to the position where system characteristics are anomalous and the process of time-first passage of boundary for a stochastic trajectory is used for the development of quantitative risk-analysis of natural extreme events. The highly-effective method for calculating the probability, mean time and its dispersion for such a transition has been obtained in the Markovian diffusion approximation. The general theory is illustrated by the study of the risk analysis of radioecological disaster in the Kara Sea.     

Increasing fiscal resilience to disasters in the Pacific

Pacific Island countries are among the list of countries that face the highest disaster risk globally—in per capita terms. In recent years, governments in the region have been confronted by a rise in damages from extreme catastrophic events, many increasingly linked to climate change. These events pose significant challenges to Pacific governments in terms of maintaining fiscal stability and the operation of their limited and under-diversified economies and shallow financial sectors. Governments in the region generally play a leading role in domestic economies and are responsible for leading disaster prevention, mitigation, and recovery efforts. Accordingly, measures to improve financial sustainability and the public sector’s ability to provide public services in the aftermath of major disasters must be prioritized. This paper examines the literature on fiscal resilience to disasters, the estimated impacts of major events in the Pacific, and analyses the applicability of available financial instruments to facilitate both ex ante and ex post disaster fiscal risk management in the region. The paper also discusses policies that can improve resilience against fiscal risks.

     

Energy production,economic growth and CO<Subscript>2</Subscript> emission: evidence from Pakistan

Extreme weather events present environmental and social challenges across the Eurasian steppe. In Mongolia much attention is given to drought and dzud (severe winter conditions) impact on rural livelihoods, landscapes and governance. A link between the two events, fostered by international and state agencies, speculates that drought leads to dzud; this has become the widely accepted doctrine. However, the relationship between the two events is assumed rather than analysed. Whilst there may be natural links between climate events, causality is more difficult to establish yet often claimed post-event. This paper stresses Mongolia’s destructive dzuds of 1999–2001 and 2009–2010 in examining drought frequency before dzud events. Findings question the hazard connection as just 3 of 32 examined dzud events were preceded by drought. Investigation did not document a relationship between the disasters; linkages between extreme events were implied rather than established. The human role in disaster also needs to be assessed as preparation, and response are key factors for mitigation. Study results identified a lack of causality between the disasters, suggesting more assiduous investigation of hazards is needed in Mongolia. This can clarify causal factors, identify risk and improve disaster mitigation strategies in Mongolia.     

Assessment of potential sediment disasters and resilience management of mountain roads using environmental indicators

In recent years, extreme rainfall events occur frequently, causing serious watershed sediment disasters, destroying mountain roads, and endangering the safety of residents' lives and property. This study aims to deal with the spatial change of potential sediment movement on the road slope pre-disaster and to screen disaster hot spots for early warning and control system. The conceptual model is used to simulate the distribution of primary and/or derived disasters on a watershed scale to assess the impact of sediment disasters caused by heavy rain event. Correlation analysis shows that the models in assessment of primary disaster and derived disaster are significantly correlated with the collapse ratio and disaster ratio, respectively. Since the primary disaster has been considered when calculating the derived disaster risk, the terrain subdivision along Provincial Highway 21 (Tai-21) is extracted to understand the derived sediment disaster on the road slope. The model can effectively evaluate the road sections prone to disasters. According to the risk level, the hot spot of road slope disasters and the management of disaster resilience are determined and can be the reference for disaster prevention and control.

     

自然灾害风险防控和应急救援平台构建与实践

为了适应当前常态减灾与非常态救灾情景下信息化管理的深度应用,提出一种面向自然灾害突发事件应对过程的业务平台的设计方案。采用数据交换方法,实现多部门之间的信息共享;建立自然灾害综合数据库,实现统一数据源管理和实时更新;采用智能移动终端推送自然灾害信息,实现政府-社会-公众多元协同;基于网络地理信息系统实时显示自然灾害风险状况,实现自然灾害风险监测预警、综合研判和应急指挥应用。该平台有效提升了自然灾害风险防控的管理水平和应急管理的工作效率,真正实现了跨领域、多灾种、全流程的自然灾害风险闭环管理和精准管控的目标。     

Success factors of enhanced disaster resilience in urban community

Due to its unique geographic environment, Taiwan is prone to natural disasters such as earthquakes and typhoons that can cause heavy casualties and huge property losses. The effects of global warming have also increased extreme climate events and the frequency and severity of natural disasters. Therefore, disaster prevention/mitigation and response is not only an important government policy issue, but also an important daily life issue. To increase the awareness of natural disasters and the importance of community safety, the Taiwan government actively promotes a community disaster prevention system. However, to avoid over-reliance on the government taskforce, the spontaneous participation and cooperation within communities can complete specific disaster preparedness and reinforce local resources for disaster prevention and response. Although the concept of disaster-resilient community (DRC) has been shaped for a long period of time, community residents cannot keep pace with the government, which may decrease the effectiveness of DRC development. Therefore, theoretical and practical studies of urban DRC become imperative. This qualitative case study used the participant observation method to collect relevant empirical data by performing action research with self-reflection. Particularly, this article is supplemented by service work experience of the researchers in DRC promotion. A qualitative analysis of case communities during training in disaster preparedness revealed the critical success factors (CSFs) affecting the level of community-based disaster prevention and protection works. Based on the literature and empirical data, the CSFs are discussed through three spindle constructs: coping strategy, operations management, and organizational behavior. Finally, the conclusions and suggestions are given for promoting sustainable DRC.     

我国自然灾害评估中亟待解决的问题

减轻自然灾害是一项系统工程，它包括对自然灾害的监测、预报、评估、防灾、抗灾、救灾、恢复、教育、保险与综合管理。通过对我国自然灾害评估现状的分析，介绍了目前我国国家级、省级和城市级自然灾害评估中亟待解决的若干问题，认为由国家、地方、主管部门组织开展全国自然灾害区划、加强自然灾害综合预报、建立自然灾害与灾情预评估、灾害应急评估与灾情评定、灾害应急救助与救援管理系统、积极开展灾害保险与灾区恢复、灾害教育与宣传、实现科学化、现代化灾害管理、实现灾害信息共享、开展减灾效益评估及建立综合减灾系统等是我国目前自然灾害评估中亟待解决的问题。     

Increasing the resilience of financial intermediaries through portfolio-level insurance against natural disasters

Financial intermediaries [FIs] in developing and emerging economies are poorly equipped to manage natural disasters. These events create losses for FIs, eroding capital reserves and compromising their ability to lend. Portfolio-level insurance against disasters can improve FI management of these events. We model microfinance intermediaries [MFIs] exposed to severe El Ni?o in Peru that can now insure against this disaster risk. Our analyses suggest that insurance allows these lenders to manage this risk more efficiently and effectively. These risk management improvements can translate into better financial performance, expansion of banking service outreach, lower interest rates, and reduced volatility in access to credit. Based on these analyses, a large MFI in Peru with which we collaborated is now managing its disaster risk using El Ni?o insurance.     

Social and Economic Impacts of Natural Disasters

Economic and social development throughout the world is frequently interrupted by extreme events. The Pacific Rim is particularly vulnerable to natural disasters, thus to social and economic losses. Although disaster events impact both developed and developing countries, in the latter, they can cause a sharp increase in poverty. As disasters pose an important challenge to the development of the Pacific Rim, it is important to assess their global, regional, economic, and social impacts. Most economic assessments of the impacts of disasters have concentrated on direct losses—that is, the financial cost of physical damage. Equally important are indirect and secondary impacts of disasters, including the destruction of communities and their negative impacts on families. The challenges posed by potential disasters in the Pacific Rim countries require rapid action, and also an energetic risk-management strategy. To help reduce those negative impacts, countries need an overall evaluation of their risks, including: (i) risk identification, (ii) risk reduction, and (iii) risk transfer. It is expected that concerted action on risk management will help create an increased awareness of the economy—wide significance of natural disasters and the problems they pose for long—term development. Accordingly, this growing awareness will lead to an increased resilience in the countries of the Pacific Rim.     

Natural hazards and climate change are not drivers of disasters

Natural Hazards - Many nations face challenges in assessing, understanding, and responding to the time-dependent nature of disaster risk. Changes in the intensity of occurrences of extreme events...     

极端洪水灾害损失评估方法及应用

极端洪水灾害具有频率低、影响范围大、损失高等特点,一般常遇洪水的灾害损失评估方法难以适用。分析了极端洪水灾害的自然属性与社会属性,认为极端洪水灾害损失具有时空分布的特性,因此借鉴空间信息格网技术,分别形成了极端洪水水文特性格网与社会经济特性格网,并将其叠加得到具有空间拓扑关系和属性信息的基于GIS的极端洪水损失空间信息格网模型,从而有效地反映了极端洪水灾害的时空特性。结合极端洪水损失率数据库,可评估极端洪水灾害损失。利用该方法评估了1998年特大洪水造成哈尔滨市江南主城区的直接经济损失,实证说明该方法可用于极端洪水灾害损失的评估。     

Predicting the resilience of transport infrastructure to a natural disaster using Cox’s proportional hazards regression model

Transport infrastructure is at significant risk of direct damage from extreme climate events such as flooding, where the cost implications of delayed recovery are generally significant. Previous research in this regard has focused on the technical and engineering aspects of infrastructure construction. The risk management of resilient transport infrastructure is poorly considered, and little has been done to quantify the capacity of transport infrastructure to recover from the impact of natural disasters under varying conditions. This paper applies Cox’s proportional hazards regression model to determine the rate of recovery and cumulative probability that recovery occurs for transport infrastructure across regional areas in New South Wales, Australia. Data for post-disaster reconstruction projects over the period 1992–2012 are used to analyze recovery rate against geographic region, natural disaster type and post-disaster transport infrastructure reconstruction cost. Results demonstrate that transport infrastructure recovered slowest when the failure is the result of a flood rather than bushfire or storm, and in regions with a riverine geography. To validate the accuracy of the model, a bootstrap resampling technique is used. The bootstrap result confirms that the model is robust and reasonable.