Macroeconomic Risk Management Against Natural Disasters


Book Description

Stefan Hochrainer develops a catastrophe risk management model. It illustrates which trade-offs and choices a country must make in managing economic risks due to natural disasters. Budgetary resources are allocated to pre-disaster risk management strategies to reduce the probability of financing gaps. The framework and model approach allows cross country comparisons as well as the assessment of financial vulnerability, macroeconomic risk, and risk management strategies. Three case studies demonstrate its flexibility and coherent approach.




Managing Disaster Risk in Emerging Economies


Book Description

In 1999 natural catastrophes and man-made disasters claimed more than 105,000 lives, 95 percent of them in the developing world, and caused economic losses of around US$100 billion. In 1998 the twin disasters of the Yangtze and Hurrican Mitch accounted for two-thirds of the US$65 billion loss. The geographical areas affected may vary, but one constant is that the per capita burden of catastrophic losses is dramatically higher in developing countries. To respond to an increased demand to assist disaster rcovery programmes, the World Bank set up the Disaster Management Facility in 1998, to help provide the Bank with a more rapid and strategic response to disaster emergencies. The DMF focuses on risk identification, risk reduction, and risk sharing/transfer, the three major topics in this volume. The DMF also promotes strategic alliances with key private, government, multilateral and nongovernmental organisations to ensure the inclusion of disaster risk reduction as a central value of development. The most important of these partnerships is the ProVention Consortium, launched in February 2000, based on the premise that we must all take responsibility for making the new millennium a safer one.




The Economic Impacts of Natural Disasters


Book Description

This work combines research and empirical evidence on the economic costs of disasters with theoretical approaches. It provides new insights on how to assess and manage the costs and impacts of disaster prevention, mitigation, recovery and adaption, and much more.







Natural Disasters and Climate Change


Book Description

This book explores economic concepts related to disaster losses, describes mechanisms that determine the economic consequences of a disaster, and reviews methodologies for making decisions regarding risk management and adaptation. The author addresses the need for better understanding of the consequences of disasters and reviews and analyzes three scientific debates on linkage between disaster risk management and adaptation to climate change. The first involves the existence and magnitude of long-term economic impact of natural disasters on development. The second is the disagreement over whether any development is the proper solution to high vulnerability to disaster risk. The third debate involves the difficulty of drawing connections between natural disasters and climate change and the challenge in managing them through an integrated strategy. The introduction describes economic views of disaster, including direct and indirect costs, output and welfare losses, and use of econometric tools to measure losses. The next section defines disaster risk, delineates between “good” and “bad” risk-taking, and discusses a pathway to balanced growth. A section entitled “Trends in Hazards and the Role of Climate Change” sets scenarios for climate change analysis, discusses statistical and physical models for downscaling global climate scenarios to extreme event scenarios, and considers how to consider extremes of hot and cold, storms, wind, drought and flood. Another section analyzes case studies on hurricanes and the US coastline; sea-level rises and storm surge in Copenhagen; and heavy precipitation in Mumbai. A section on Methodologies for disaster risk management includes a study on cost-benefit analysis of coastal protections in New Orleans, and one on early-warning systems in developing countries. The next section outlines decision-making in disaster risk management, including robust decision-making, No-regret and No-risk strategies; and strategies that reduce time horizons for decision-making. Among the conclusions is the assertion that risk management policies must recognize the benefits of risk-taking and avoid suppressing it entirely. The main message is that a combination of disaster-risk-reduction, resilience-building and adaptation policies can yield large potential gains and synergies.




Disaster Risk Reduction for Economic Growth and Livelihood


Book Description

The prevalence of natural disasters in recent years has highlighted the importance of preparing adequately for disasters and dealing efficiently with their consequences. This book addresses how countries can enhance their resilience against natural disasters and move towards economic growth and sustainable development. Covering a wide range of issues, it shows how well thought-out measures can be applied to minimize the impacts of disasters in a variety of situations. Starting with the need for coping with a rapidly changing global environment, the book goes on to demonstrate ways to strengthen awareness of the effectiveness of preventive measures, including in the reconstruction phase. The book also covers the roles played by different actors as well as tools and technologies for improved disaster risk reduction. It focuses on a variety of case studies from across Asia, Africa and Latin America, drawing out lessons that can be applied internationally. This book will be of great interest to professionals in disaster management, including national governments, donors, communities/citizens, NGOs and private sector. It will also be a highly valuable resource for students and researchers in disaster management and policy, development studies and economics.




Natural Disaster Hotspots


Book Description

This synthesis summarizes the findings of the Global Natural Disaster Risk Hotspots project. The Hotspots project generated a global disaster risk assessment and a set of more localized or hazard-specific case studies. The synthesis draws primarily from the results of the global assessment. Full details on the data, methods and results of the global analysis can be found in volume one of Natural Disaster Hotspots: A Global Risk Analysis. The case studies are contained in volume two (forthcoming).




Unbreakable


Book Description

'Economic losses from natural disasters totaled $92 billion in 2015.' Such statements, all too commonplace, assess the severity of disasters by no other measure than the damage inflicted on buildings, infrastructure, and agricultural production. But $1 in losses does not mean the same thing to a rich person that it does to a poor person; the gravity of a $92 billion loss depends on who experiences it. By focusing on aggregate losses—the traditional approach to disaster risk—we restrict our consideration to how disasters affect those wealthy enough to have assets to lose in the first place, and largely ignore the plight of poor people. This report moves beyond asset and production losses and shifts its attention to how natural disasters affect people’s well-being. Disasters are far greater threats to well-being than traditional estimates suggest. This approach provides a more nuanced view of natural disasters than usual reporting, and a perspective that takes fuller account of poor people’s vulnerabilities. Poor people suffer only a fraction of economic losses caused by disasters, but they bear the brunt of their consequences. Understanding the disproportionate vulnerability of poor people also makes the case for setting new intervention priorities to lessen the impact of natural disasters on the world’s poor, such as expanding financial inclusion, disaster risk and health insurance, social protection and adaptive safety nets, contingent finance and reserve funds, and universal access to early warning systems. Efforts to reduce disaster risk and poverty go hand in hand. Because disasters impoverish so many, disaster risk management is inseparable from poverty reduction policy, and vice versa. As climate change magnifies natural hazards, and because protection infrastructure alone cannot eliminate risk, a more resilient population has never been more critical to breaking the cycle of disaster-induced poverty.




Natural Disaster Risk Management


Book Description

This textbook provides a thorough introduction to natural disaster risk management. Many aspects of disaster risk management, such as those involved in earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, floods, avalanches and mudslides call for similar prevention and preparedness instruments, management concepts, and countermeasures. This textbook assumes the viewpoint of a regional disaster risk manager who is responsible for a certain area, and for making the lives of the people who live there safer, regardless of the type of natural disaster that may occur. The same holds true for boosting preparedness and awareness in the population at risk. The book includes numerous examples of hazard mitigation concepts and techniques, as well as ways of intensively involving the local population in prevention schemes at an early stage. Furthermore, it provides an in-depth examination of the function of risk communication, both as an instrument for disseminating official information and as a function of public media. In closing, a chapter on risk splitting offers insights into insurance-based models for risk financing. This comprehensive book is a must-read for all students, researchers and practitioners dealing with natural disaster risk management.




Economic Effects of Natural Disasters


Book Description

Economic Effects of Natural Disasters explores how natural disasters affect sources of economic growth and development. Using theoretical econometrics and real-world data, and drawing on advances in climate change economics, the book shows scholars and researchers how to use various research methods and techniques to investigate and respond to natural disasters. No other book presents empirical frameworks for the evaluation of the quality of macroeconomic research practice with a focus on climate change and natural disasters. Because many of these subjects are so large, different regions of the world use different approaches, hence this resource presents tailored economic applications and evidence. - Connects economic theories and empirical work in climate change to natural disaster research - Shows how advances in climate change and natural disaster research can be implemented in micro- and macroeconomic simulation models - Addresses structural changes in countries afflicted by climate change and natural disasters