Basics of Disaster and Risk Management

Basic Concept of Disaster and Disaster Risk

• A disaster is a sudden, calamitous event that seriously disrupts a community or society, causing significant human, material, and economic or environmental losses exceeding the community's ability to cope using its own resources. (International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies)
• Disasters are natural or man-made emergencies that cannot be handled by affected communities. They result in severe danger, loss of lives and properties, and societal disruption, preventing the fulfillment of community essentials. (Disaster Risk Reduction Resource Manual)
• Disaster risk is the probability that a community's structure or geographic area will be damaged or disrupted by a hazard, considering its nature, construction, and proximity to hazardous areas. (ADPC – Asian Disaster Preparedness Center, 2012)

Elements of Disaster Risk

• Hazard: Any phenomenon that can cause damage to life, property, or the environment.
• Exposure: Any element (people, property, systems) present in the hazard and prone to potential loss.
• Vulnerability: The likelihood that assets will be damaged or destroyed when exposed to a hazardous event.

Nature/Origin of Disasters

• Natural Disasters: Originate from natural forces (geological, meteorological, hydrometeorological, and biological). Examples include: earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, typhoons, cyclones, agricultural diseases, storm surges, drought, earthquakes, hurricanes, landslides, thunderstorms, tornadoes, tsunamis, wildfires, sinkholes, emergency diseases (pandemic influenza).
• Human-Made Disasters: Occur due to people's actions against humans, material, and the environment. Examples include transport and industrial accidents (air/train crashes, chemical spills, building collapses), terrorism, hazardous materials, power service disruptions, nuclear power plant accidents, radiological emergencies, chemical and biological weapons threats, cyber attacks, and explosions.

Types of Disasters

• Natural: Agricultural diseases, Pests, Storm surge, Drought, Water shortage (El Niño), Earthquake, Hurricanes/Tropical storms, Landslides/Debris flows, Thunderstorms/Lightning, Tornadoes, Tsunamis, Wildfires, Sinkholes, Emergency diseases
• Human-made/Technological: Hazardous materials, Power service disruption/blackout, Nuclear power plant accidents/nuclear blasts, Radiological emergencies, Chemical threat/biological weapons, Cyber attacks, Explosions, Civil unrest

Risk Factors Underlying Disasters

• Severity of Exposure: Injury and life threats lead to mental health problems. At least half of disaster survivors experience distress or mental health issues requiring clinical care.
• Gender and Family: Women often suffer more adverse effects, worsened by children in the household. Marital conflicts and lack of support increase recovery difficulties.
• Age: Adults aged 40-60 are more stressed after disasters, but children generally exhibit more stress than adults.
• Low or Negative Social Support: Social support weakens after disasters, often due to stress and the need for support network members to cope with their own lives.
• Economic Status: Developing countries are more vulnerable. Poor housing, lack of early warning systems, and weak safety nets compound disaster impacts.
• Climate Change: Alters disaster frequency/intensity, impacts vulnerability to hazards, and changes exposure patterns. Fossil fuel burning, deforestation, and other practices increase greenhouse gas concentrations.
• Environmental Degradation: Deforestation increases landslide hazards; mangrove removal increases storm surge damage.
• Globalization: Increased exposure of assets in hazard-prone areas, but opportunities for resilience if managed effectively, including risk-sensitive development strategies, infrastructure investment, environmental management, and improving informal settlements.
• Poverty and Inequality: Impoverished people live in hazard-exposed areas, lack access to insurance/social protections, often drawing on limited resources to cushion losses. Disasters disproportionally impact vulnerable populations.
• Poorly Planned and Managed Urban Development: Growing urbanization concentrations, especially when rapid and poorly planned in contexts of widespread poverty, create and concentrate risks.
• Weak Governance: Public sector actors are unable/unwilling to protect rights, provide services, which increases disaster risk, disproportionately focused in low-income countries. Disaster risk governance involves specific arrangements to manage disaster risk within wider risk governance.

Disasters and Its Effects

• Displaced Population: Natural disasters (earthquakes, floods, typhoons) force people to abandon their homes in search of refuge.
• Health Risks: Disasters diminish population health, caused by stagnant water breeding waterborne bacteria/malaria-carrying mosquitoes and lack of clean water.
• Food Scarcity: Damage to farms, farm-to-market roads, high prices, and limited buying capacity of victims increase food shortages.
• Psychological Impacts: The devastating impacts are traumatic. Exposure to deaths and catastrophe has a profound effect especially on children. PTSD is also a serious psychological condition needing early treatment to prevent long-term emotional distress

Disaster from Different Perspectives

• Physical: Disaster is the phenomenon causing damage to physical components (buildings, infrastructure, people/property). Physical effects are the most visible and quantifiable aspects of disasters. Damaged infrastructure, injuries, and physical disabilities all are major features of any disaster..
• Psychological: Research shows that disasters cause significant mental health issues for survivors, with factors like injury severity, family stress, lack of social support, age and poverty often correlating with such consequences. Key aspects of psychological disaster impact are emotional effects, and cognitive effects.
• Socio-cultural: Disaster is defined by societal responses and cultural factors determining the level of risk, resilience, and vulnerability. These factors can include religion, social hierarchy, cultural values, traditions, and perceptions of the disaster within the society. Socio-cultural effects are in individual roles, and in the disruption of social relationships.
• Economic: A disaster disrupts the economic system through loss of employment, assets, production, output, and consumption. Assessing economic loss involves both direct and indirect costs, and also often assessing the impact on livelihoods.
• Biological: Prevalent diseases and viruses at epidemic or pandemic levels constitute biological disasters. Catastrophic loss-of-life and public demobilization, as well as severe economic damage and unemployment is the likely result.
• Political: Public policies (mitigation, preparation, responses, and recovery from disasters) are influenced by how local officials operate. trust in government institutions and the availability of sufficient aid directly affect the government's capacity to address disaster risk.

This quiz focuses on the fundamental concepts of disasters and disaster risk. It covers the definitions, elements, and implications of disasters, both natural and man-made. Test your understanding of the critical aspects that contribute to disaster risk and readiness in communities.