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Effective financing that
reduces risk to natural hazards
Margareta Wahlstrom, Special Representative of the Secretary-General for Disaster Reduction,
United Nations International Strategy for Disaster Reduction
T
he 2011 Global Assessment Report on Disaster Risk
Reduction (GAR11) highlights the political and economic
imperative to reduce disaster risks, and the benefits to
be gained from doing so. It offers guidance and suggestions to
Governments and non-governmental actors alike on how they
can work together to reduce disaster risks.
Many countries have made commendable progress in reducing
mortality risk, at least for weather-related hazards. Unfortunately, far
less progress is being made on addressing other disaster risks, and
the cost of disaster-related economic loss and damage is still rising.
The biennial global assessment of disaster risk reduction was
prepared in the context of the United Nations International Strategy
for Disaster Reduction (UNISDR). GAR11 explores the challenges
for effective disaster risk reduction (DRR) investment and highlights
the need for systematic accounting of disaster losses and impacts
and comprehensive assessment of disaster risks. These are critical
transformative steps that allow governments to visualize and assess
the trade-offs.
The International Strategy for Disaster Reduction (ISDR) is a stra-
tegic framework adopted by United Nations Member States in 2000.
The ISDR guides and coordinates the efforts of a wide range of part-
ners to achieve a substantive reduction in disaster losses. It aims to
build resilient nations and communities as an essential condition for
sustainable development.
The Hyogo Framework for Action World Conference on Disaster
Reduction, held in Japan in 2005, concluded a groundbreaking agree-
ment that provides a clear mandate for action to reduce disaster risks,
namely the Hyogo Framework for Action 2005-2015: Building the
Resilience of Nations and Communities to Disasters. The overrid-
ing expected outcome of the Hyogo Framework for Action (HFA) is
the ‘substantial reduction of disaster losses, in lives and in the social,
economic and environmental assets of communities and states’.
Currently, 133 countries are reviewing their progress towards the
objectives and goals of the HFA for 2009-2011. Governments have
reviewed their progress against each of the Priority Areas of the
HFA, and have also provided detailed information on challenges in
critical areas such as investment and risk assessment, with much
supporting evidence.
Governments have explicit responsibility for the safety of
publicly owned assets and for protecting the lives, livelihoods
and uninsured private assets of households and communities
after disasters. Each country has its own unique risk profile of
extensive, intensive and emerging risks. Ideally, Governments
should adopt a mix of prospective, corrective and compensatory
risk management strategies. Without accounting for
disaster losses and impacts, few countries have been
able to find the political and economic incentives to
invest in DRR.
As new development decisions and investments
are taken, risks may not be immediately apparent
and the potential losses could go unmanaged. This
may cause longer-term effects such as increasing
poverty, declining human development and reduced
economic growth. Climate change adaptation in
particular requires increased attention to underlying
risk drivers, reducing vulnerability and strengthening
risk governance capacities.
Risk trends
Risks associated with disasters are complex and
dynamic, therefore exposure to certain risks can
increase whilst exposure to others does not. GAR 2011
indicates, for example, that while earthquake mortality
risk may be increasing, particularly in countries expe-
riencing rapid urban growth, mortality risk associated
with major weather-related hazards is now declining
globally. This trend includes Asia, where most of the
risk is concentrated. Although the number of people
exposed to tropical cyclones and floods continues to
increase, countries are successfully reducing their
vulnerabilities and strengthening their disaster manage-
ment capacities.
However, apparent success in reducing mortality
from tropical cyclone disasters has not translated into
improvements in the governance of earthquake risk.
The multiple feedback loops that exist among urbaniza-
tion, ecosystem decline, poverty and governance allow
risk to be configured while simultaneously obscuring
causality. In attempting to reduce risks associated with
a range of hazards, authorities must make trade-offs
between them.
Countries are also faced with a range of emerging
risks associated with extremely low-probability hazards
such as volcanic eruptions or extreme space weather,
and new patterns of vulnerability associated with the
growing complexity and interdependency of the tech-
nological systems on which modern societies depend,
including energy, telecommunications, finance and
banking, transport, water and sanitation. These new
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