Hazard to Disaster

• Factors that lead to disasters

  • Poor governance (corruption)
  • Geology (soft sediment by rivers – more intense shaking)
  • Lack of building codes
  • Lines of communication (e.g. being Broken)
  • Land use planning/layout (e.g. hospital being built on the edge of the city and hard to reach)
• Vulnerability:

  ·         The degree of resilience offered by a social system to the response of a hazard.

  ·         The risk of exposure to hazards combined with the inability to cope with them.

   

  Risk:

  ·         The probability of a hazard occurring and leading to a loss of life or livelihood.

   

  Resilience:

  ·         The degree to which a society or environment can absorb a hazardous event and yet remain in the same state of organisation – its ability to cope with the stress and recover.

   
• How is vulnerability different to risk?

  ·         Risk is the probability that an event will occur causing a loss of life.

  Vulnerability is how the society copes with an event once it has occurred
• Factors increasing vulnerability:

  ·         Lacking capital and resources.

  ·         Population growth.

  ·         Having a high dependency ration.

  ·         Ethnicity – if you don’t speak the language.

  ·         Poor health.

  ·         Lack of effective governance (corruption).

  ·         Armed conflict.

  ·         Unsustainable natural resource management.

  ·         Geographical location – rural areas.

  ·         Ageing infrastructure.

  ·         Over reliance on a technical fix.
• Factors decreasing vulnerability:

  ·         Education.

  ·         Having capital.

  ·         Good health.

  ·         Effective governance.

  ·         Low dependency ration.

  ·         Social equality.

  ·         Warning and emergency response system.

  ·         Government assistance.

  ·         Aid.

  ·         Insurance.

  ·         Scientific understanding.

  ·         Hazard engineering.
• Types of vulnerability


  • Human vulnerability
  • Window of vulnerability
  • Physical vulnerability
  • Social vulnerability
  • Economic vulnerability
  • Environmental vulnerability
• Human vulnerability


  The inability of people, organisations and society to withstand the adverse impacts from the hazard to which they are exposed to
• Window of vulnerability

  A time frame within which societies defensive measures are reduced, compromised or lacking
• Physical vulnerability


  • Exposure to potential hazards
  • E.g. Geographic location, living on slopes or floodplains
• Social vulnerability


  • Factors affecting a populations resilience to cope with a disaster
  • E.g. Population growth or war
• Economic vulnerability


  • Economic factors affecting the ability to react financially
  • E.g. Availability of insurance, diversity of economic base
• Environmental vulnerability


  • Potential for environmental damage
  • E.g. Susceptible to soil erosion or waste pollution