From Global Environmental Change Volume 57, July 2019.
Highlights
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- We quantified the dynamics of socio-economic vulnerability to climate-related hazards.
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- A decreasing trend in both human and economic vulnerability is evident.
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- Global average mortality and loss rates have dropped by 6.5 and nearly 5 times, respectively, from 1980 to 1989 to 2007–2016.
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- Results also show a clear negative relation between vulnerability and wealth.
Abstract
Death
tolls and economic losses from natural hazards continue to rise in many
parts of the world. With the aim to reduce future impacts from natural
disasters it is crucial to understand the variability in space and time
of the vulnerability of people and economic assets. In this paper we
quantified the temporal dynamics of socio-economic vulnerability,
expressed as fatalities over exposed population and losses over exposed
GDP, to climate-related hazards between 1980 and 2016. Using a global,
spatially explicit framework that integrates population and economic
dynamics with one of the most complete natural disaster loss databases
we quantified mortality and loss rates across income levels and analyzed
their relationship with wealth. Results show a clear decreasing trend
in both human and economic vulnerability, with global average mortality
and economic loss rates that have dropped by 6.5 and nearly 5 times,
respectively, from 1980–1989 to 2007–2016. We further show a clear
negative relation between vulnerability and wealth, which is strongest
at the lowest income levels. This has led to a convergence in
vulnerability between higher and lower income countries. Yet, there is
still a considerable climate hazard vulnerability gap between poorer and
richer countries.
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