Dark Side
Not Merely "Natural" Disasters
By HSNW 18/8/10
Aug 22, 2010 - 8:08:32 AM

The recent disasters in Pakistan, China, and Haiti have done more than kill thousands and displace millions: they have raised questions about whether the modifier "natural" -- as in "natural disaster" -- is accurate in describing the sources and scope of the catastrophes; these and other recent disasters, in other words, raise questions about how much of the damage caused comes from the forces of nature and how much is the result of human activity; experts say that a major contributing factor to the scope of these disasters are development decisions which are too often controlled by wealthy and corrupt elites who have no interest in protecting people who have been marginalized by poverty

The latest flooding and mudslides in China and Pakistan have done more than kill thousands and displace millions: they have raised questions about whether the modifier “natural” — as in “natural disaster” — is accurate in describing the sources and scope of the catastrophes.

These and other recent disasters, in other words, raise questions about how much of the damage caused comes from the forces of nature and how much is the result of human activity.

* The floods in China are the worst in decades, despite the billions of dollars that the Chinese government has spent on giant dam projects designed to mitigate flooding of the country’s major rivers. So far, more than 1,500 people have been confirmed dead in the northwest province of Gansu, and more heavy rain is predicted in the coming days.
* Pakistan is experiencing its heaviest monsoon rains on record, covering a quarter of the country in water, killing more than 2,000 people, and displacing nearly twenty millions.
* The 24 January magnitude 7.0 earthquake in Haiti caused an estimated 230,000 deaths, 300,000 people had been injured, and more than 1,000,000 made homeless. Experts estimate that 250,000 residences and 30,000 commercial buildings had collapsed or were severely damaged

NPR’s Corey Flintoff reports that these disasters are deadlier and costlier because of the high concentrations of people and development in their paths. Experts say the strategies for reducing such losses are well-known. What is lacking is the political will to put them into effect.

Migration and development have outstripped government planning in many areas, particularly with the rapid economic growth and urban expansion in China. Cities have swollen as people migrate from the countryside in search of work. Poor people typically wind up squatting on land — in many cases, on land that was unused before because it was known to be unsafe.

The 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami was considered by many to be a global wake-up call. The disaster, which began with an undersea earthquake on 26 December, is thought to have killed more than 230,000 people in fourteen countries.

Less than a month later, a world conference in Kobe, Japan, came up with a strategic plan for reducing losses from disasters. The main idea was to make disaster planning a part of government development policies so countries would be more resilient to hazards.

Flintoff quotes Ben Wisner, an expert on hazards in the developing world, to say that China has imposed “a kind of superficial structural modernism” in some of its least-developed areas. This includes building schools, hospitals, and housing blocks in places that had little infrastructure before.

“A lot of the policies have been really progressive, for instance, trying to encourage primary and secondary education in formerly isolated areas,” Wisner says. “But the problem was that a lot of the schools were poorly built, and they’re the ones that fell down in the [2008 Sichuan] earthquake.”

Unsound building practices in unsafe areas — such as unstable hillsides or flood-prone riversides — can compound the damage and casualties from events that would have been fairly minor in the past (with regard to Haiti, see “Engineers urge overhaul of Haiti’s archaic, anarchic building practices,” 26 January 2010 HSNW; “Haiti’s lack of building standards major contributor to scope of disaster,” 18 January 2010 HSNW; and “Haitian architects, urban planners say the need is to build a better Haiti,” 28 January 2010 HSNW).

It is not that governments do not understand the problem, Kathleen Tierney, director of the Natural Hazards Center at the University of Colorado, Boulder, told Flintoff.

Tierney, who just returned from a teaching and research stint in China, says Beijing is developing fairly effective mechanisms for dealing with disasters after they occur. “They have a very clear role for the army, and they have the capability to rescue people and provide relief,” she says.

When it comes to preventing losses from disasters, however, Tierney gives the Chinese government lower marks. “Chinese officials understand that they face multiple hazards, but they’re not yet doing a good job to mitigate those hazards,” she says.

Wisner, who has advised the U.S. Federal Emergency Management Agency and the United Nations on disaster-risk reduction, says that ultimately dealing with calamity is a matter of political will. “The expertise exists,” Wisner says. “All this stuff is known. The question one has to ask is why are these mistakes [in development] being made over and over again?”

Wisner says that development decisions are too often controlled by wealthy elites who have no interest in protecting people who have been marginalized by poverty. This is a delicate way of highlighting the three major problems any effort to improve conditions in Pakistan and Haiti faces: the governments of both countries are corrupt, ineffective, and indifferent to the welfare of their people. Large portions of aid and relief money donated by foreign governments and international organizations in the wake of disasters never reach the intended recipients because it is stolen by government ministers and state officials up and down the bureaucracy. When it comes to money aimed to fund infrastructure projects for the future, an even larger portion of it disappears into the country leaders’ private bank accounts.

Even where a government wants to do the right thing, as is the case with China, Wisner says, decisions on development are often made from the top down, without consulting with local people.

Both Wisner and Tierney point out that governments should have a strong interest in mitigating natural hazards. As development surges, so does the human and economic cost of disasters. The experts note that governments have fallen when their people lost faith in their ability to deal with disasters.