Nat Hazards (2009) 48:439456 DOI 10.

1007/s11069-008-9272-0 ORIGINAL PAPER

A comparison of selected global disaster risk assessment results

Silvia Mosquera-Machado Maxx Dilley

Received: 7 May 2008 / Accepted: 24 June 2008 / Published online: 19 July 2008 Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2008

Abstract We compare country risk rankings derived from two recently published global disaster risk analyses. One set of country rankings is based on the Disaster Risk Index (DRI) developed by the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP) Division of Early Warning and Assessment Global Resource Information Database project under a contract to the United Nations Development Program (UNDP). The other is based on an index of disaster mortality risk developed by the Global Natural Disaster Risk Hotspots project implemented by Columbia University, the World Bank and associated partners. We convert data from these sources into two comparable indexes of disaster mortality risk and rank countries according to the resulting values for a set of natural hazards common to both studies. The country rankings are moderately correlated, ranging from .41 to .56 for individual hazards to .31 for multi-hazard mortality risks. We identify the top 25 countries according to the mortality risk values we recomputed from each studys results to show the degree to which countries are highly ranked in common. The numbers of countries common to both lists for individual hazards range from 7 to 16 out of 25. The correspondence among the top 25 ranked countries is lowest for earthquakes and oods. Only 6 out of 25 countries are common to both lists in the multi-hazard case. We suggest that while the convergence in the results for some hazards is encouraging, more work is needed to improve data and methods, particularly with respect to assessing the role of vulnerability in the creation of risk and the calculation of multi-hazard risks.

The views expressed are the authors and do not necessarily reect those of SM2 Consulting Multi-Hazards and Risk Holistic Solutions or the United Nations Development Program. S. Mosquera-Machado (&) Multi-Hazards and Risks Holistic Solutions, SM2 Consulting, 34 A Gail Drive, Nyack, NY 10960, USA e-mail: smosqueramachado@gmail.com M. Dilley United Nations Development Program, Bureau for Crisis Prevention and Recovery, International Environment House, 11-13 Chemin des Anemones, 1219 Chatelaine, Geneva, Switzerland e-mail: Maxx.Dilley@undp.org

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Keywords Single hazard risk Multi-hazard risk Mortality risk Disaster Risk Index Disaster Risk Hotspots GIS Abbreviations DRI Disaster Risk Index EM-DAT Emergency events database GIS Geographic information system ISDR International Strategy for Disaster Reduction UNDP United Nations Development Program UNEP United Nations Environment Program GSHAP Global Seismic Hazard Assessment Program GPW Gridded population of the world PGA Peak ground acceleration

1 Introduction In January 2005, governments and international agencies, concerned with mounting natural disaster losses, dened a set of risk management priorities in the Hyogo Framework for Action 20052015. The expected outcome of the Hyogo Framework is the substantial reduction of disaster losses, in lives and in the social, economic and environmental assets of communities and countries (ISDR 2005). Achieving this goal will require prioritizing high risk areas in which to implement measures to reduce exposure and vulnerability to natural hazards. This article compares the selected results from two global analyses of disaster-related mortality risk constructed for this purpose. We compare country rankings based on UNDPs Disaster Risk Index (DRI) (UNDP 2004) with country rankings based on an index of disaster mortality risk developed by the Disaster Risk Hotspots project (Dilley et al. 2005). The DRI was developed under a contract with UNDP by the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP) Division of Early Warning and Assessment Global Resource Information Database project; the Hotspots project was a collaboration between Columbia University, the World Bank and other partners as an activity of the ProVention Consortium. Both studies have inuenced disaster risk management practice internationally. Referring to Natural Disaster Hotspots: A Global Risk Analysis, the World Banks Independent Evaluation Group stated, By determining the prevalence of natural disasters using a common geospatial unit of reference in all countries, and by ranking countries in terms of highest risk potential, this study is inuencing risk mitigation investments and informing the Bank and other donors on how to better manage future emergency lending (http://www.worldbank. org/ieg/awards/2006_winners_natural_disasters.html). In 2006, UNDPs Reducing Disaster Risk: A Challenge for Development (2004) was the fourth most downloaded document on the UNDP website. UNDP, the World Bank and other major organizations involved in disaster risk management internationally are using the DRI and Hotspots results as a basis for country prioritization. UNDP, for example, has placed a dozen national disaster reduction advisors in high-risk countries on the basis of these results. The World Banks Global Facility for Disaster Reduction and Recovery used the Hotspots results as one basis for selecting priority countries as candidates for disaster reduction grants. Given their policy implications, it is of more than academic interest to understand how the results of these two projects compare. The two studies were undertaken independently but data, methods and outputs were shared throughout implementation by the two project

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teams. Interaction took place through a working group of the International Strategy for Disaster Reduction (ISDR) on vulnerability, risk, and impacts assessment chaired by the United Nations Development Program (UNDP). The results of a third project on which there was collaboration through the ISDR working group, which generated a set of Indicators of Disaster Risk and Risk Management in Latin America and the Caribbean (Cardona 2005; IDEA 2005), are not quantitatively comparable to those of the Hotspots project and the DRI, and therefore, we do not review them here. The resulting similarities and differences by comparing of these two particular projects and their results are interesting. Below, we summarize the input data, methods, and results of the Hotspots and DRI projects. Through a comparative analysis we identify the extent to which selected results converge and diverge. We hope our analysis assists the audience for these project reports in interpreting their ndings and identies useful areas for further research. 2 Data and methods Pelling (2004) qualitatively compared the DRI and Hotspots projects and their reports (Table 1). Both projects assessed risks of disaster-related mortality associated with cyclones, drought, earthquakes, oods, and landslides. Quantitative comparison of the results can only be done selectively and with additional processing of the input data, however, because: (1) Although the Hotspots project computed risks of disaster-related mortality and economic losses, the DRI computed only mortality risks. Therefore, only the mortality risk results are comparable. The Hotspots project uses 5 km 9 5 km (2.50 ) grid cells as the unit of analysis whereas the DRI results are presented at the country level. So comparing the DRI and Hotspots mortality risk values requires aggregating the latter to the country level. The two projects report their results in relative, rather than absolute terms, but the relative risk results are expressed differently in each case and are not directly comparable. Although each project calculated absolute mortality risks, neither reports these risks in absolute terms, i.e., as the probability of a given number of people being killed over a given period in particular locations. Rather, the Hotspots project classied grid cells into deciles based on the computed risk of mortality for each cell and further grouped the deciles into four classes of cells equivalent to high, medium, low and negligible risk. UNDP (2004) reports the relative historical vulnerability of each country to each hazard, expressed as average annual deaths in relation to average annual hazard exposure per million inhabitants over a 21-year period. In order to compare the results, we converted the unreported absolute disaster-related mortality risk values on which the two different relative risk ranking systems were based into comparable country rankings of relative risk. The set of hazards considered by each project is different, which affects the comparability of multi-hazard risks. We recomputed the multi-hazard risk values reported by the Hotspots project to obtain comparable values to those reported in UNDP (2004).

(2)

(3)

(4)

In order to undertake a direct comparison we performed the following steps: (1) For each country, for each hazard and for a group of hazards common to both projects, we convert the relative mortality risk values to absolute terms: the number

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Table 1 Summary of major DRI (UNDP 2004), and Hotspots (Dilley et al. 2005) project characteristics from Pelling (2004) Project Objective DRI To demonstrate the ways in which development contributes to human vulnerability and risk Global National and international agencies National Hotspots To identify those sub-national places in the world with high multi-hazard risk Global International and national agencies Sub-national 2.50 grid cells (ca. 5 km 9 5 km) Maps ood, earthquake, landslide, drought, volcano and cyclone hazard worldwide Identies relative risks of mortality and economic loss for populations and economic assets exposed to single and multiple hazards Estimates relative risks of mortality and economic losses Earthquake, cyclone, ood, landslide, drought and volcano

Coverage Principal audience Unit of analysis

Key contributions Identies independent hazard specic socio-economic indicators of national vulnerability. Proposes a simple measure of relative vulnerability Maps earthquake, tropical cyclone hazard and ood hazard worldwide

Hazard

Earthquake, cyclone, ood, and drought. Landslide has been partly studied through work coordinated by the Norwegian Geotechnical Institute (1) The ratio between mortality and population exposed (2) Derived from socio-economic indicators calibrated against disaster mortality Disaster mortality calculated as a product of hazard, population exposed and vulnerability variables Short time-span for mortality loss data compared to hazard frequency (volcano and earthquake) Limited availability of appropriate socio-economic variables

Vulnerability

Represented by historical disaster mortality and economic loss rates for 28 groups of regions and country wealth classes for each hazard type Disaster mortality and economic losses calculated as products of hazard, elements exposed and vulnerability Lack of sub-national data on mortality and economic loss Does not identify specic vulnerability factors Sub-national dimensioning of hazard exposure and disaster risk Focus on large and medium events Measuring disaster risk to ecological and environmental systems that impact of human welfare National and sub-national case study ground truthing Temporal comparisons Dynamic risk assessment

Risk

Limitations

Complementarity National dimensioning of vulnerability factors and disaster risk Focus on large and medium events Future possibilities Measuring disaster risk to ecological and environmental systems that impact of human welfare National and sub-national case-study ground truthing Time-series analysis Dynamic risk assessment Contribution to benchmarking

(2) (3)

of people at risk of being killed per million inhabitants, annually in the DRI case and based on population in the year 2000 in the case of Hotspots. We rank the countries according to the results for each hazard and the multi-hazard case. We compare the country rank orders.

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By comparing country rank orders, we are comparing relative rather than absolute risk levels. Available global data are inadequate for accurately calculating the probability disaster-related mortality in any particular place. Both the DRI and Hotspots projects assume, however, that the data are adequate for assessing whether a particular type of lossin this case mortalityis more or less likely to occur in one place than in another. Consistently, our comparison is also on the basis of relative risk. The following sections describe the specic indexes that we have selected for comparison from each set of project results, the general methodology by which each index was originally constructed, and the transformations we applied to obtain comparable indexes. Full details on the data and methods through which the original indexes were created are contained in the project reports (UNDP 2004; Dilley et al. 2005). 2.1 DRI disaster-related mortality risk country rankings In UNDP (2004), in addition to relative country hazard vulnerability based on annual deaths per million exposed inhabitants, the DRI also involved calculating a set of multiple regression equations for each of four hazards: drought, earthquakes, oods, and tropical cyclones (Table 2). Landslide-related risks are included among those associated with cyclones and oods and cannot be disaggregated. In this facet of the DRI, a multiple regression equation was created for each hazard incorporating all countries for which data was available. The dependent variable in each regression model is mortality, while the independent variables are population hazard exposure and one or more socio-economic variables. The latter were selected based on the extent to which the correlation between observed and predicted mortality was improved by incorporating candidate socio-economic variables in the model, as well as the plausibility of these variables as explanatory factors in the losses associated with each hazard. Observed mortality for tting the regression equations (correlating observed and predicted
Table 2 Multiple logarithmic regression models used to calculate the DRI (UNDP 2004) Hazards Multiple logarithmic regression model Variables

Earthquake ln(K) = 1.26 ln(PhExp) + 12.27 Ug - 16.22 Flood ln(K) = 0.78 ln(PhExp) + 0.45 ln(GDPcap) - 0.15(D) - 5.22

K is the number of killed from earthquakes PhExp is the Physical Exposure to earthquakes Ug is the rate of urban growth K is the number of killed from oods PhExp is the Physical Exposure to oods GDPcap is the normalized Gross Domestic Product per capita D is the local population density K is the number of killed from cyclones PhExp is the Physical Exposure to cyclones Pal is the transformed value of percentage of arable land HDI is the transformed value of the Human Development Index PhExp_3_50 is the number of people exposed per year to droughts. A drought is dened as a period of at least 3 months B50% of the average precipitation level (IRI 2002; CIESIN/IFPRI/WRI 2000) WATTOT is the percent of population with access to improved water supply

Cyclone

ln(K) = 0.63 ln(PhExp) + 0.66 ln (Pal) - 2.03(HDI) - 15.86

Drought

ln(K) = 1.26 ln(PhExp3_50) + 7.58 ln(WATTOT) + 14.4

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losses for the purposes of selecting independent variables for inclusion in the model) came from EM-DAT, the OFDA/CRED international disaster database (http://www.em-dat.be). Missing socio-economic data for some countries meant that the DRI could only be calculated for the subset of countries for which the socio-economic data required by the regression model for any given hazard was available. We obtained a value representing the population at risk of disaster-related mortality annually per million inhabitants for each hazard in each country from the logarithm of deaths per million inhabitants per year, provided by Peduzzi, Herold and Dao (pers. commun.), as estimated by the relevant DRI regression equation. We computed a multihazard mortality gure by summing the number of people at risk per million inhabitants across all hazards for each country, following the methodology in UNDP (2004, p. 101). After taking the antilogarithm, the resulting values are comparable to national mortality risk index values obtainable from the Hotspots project results as described below.

2.2 Hotspots disaster-related mortality risk country rankings The Hotspots project (Dilley et al. 2005) calculated relative risks of disaster-related mortality and economic loss risks for each of six hazards: cyclones, drought, earthquakes, oods, landslides, and volcanoes. Risks associated with each hazard are based on population and GDP hazard exposure for each 2.50 grid cell on the earths land surface weighted by a vulnerability coefcient. The vulnerability coefcients reect historical mortality and economic loss rates for seven geographic regions and four country wealth classes (a total of 28 vulnerability coefcients for each hazard) computed from data in EM-DAT. Hazard exposure for each cell is weighted by the vulnerability value for the geographic area in which the cell is located to compute risks of losses. After discarding all cells with insignicant hazard exposure, the approximately 4 million remaining grid cells were sorted and classied as low (the lowest 40%), medium (the middle 30%) and high risk (the top 30%) and the results are presented as geographic distributions of relative risk. The Hotspots analysis reports three indexes for each grid cell, reecting the relative disaster-related risks of: (i) mortality, assessed for global grided population; (ii) total economic losses, assessed for global grided GDP per unit area, and (iii) economic losses expressed as a proportion of the GDP per unit area for each grid cell. In the Hotspots analysis, multiple attributes are assigned to each grid cell, including not only the decile class to which each cell pertains, but also the original calculated mortality risk value used to classify the cells into mortality risk deciles. The latter represents absolute expected mortality in each grid cell, based on the degree of hazard exposure in the cell and representative historical loss rates. Since this value is given for each grid cell rather than for entire countries, we sum the mortality risk values across all grid cells in each country and divide the result by the number of millions of inhabitants in 2000, estimated from the Gridded Population of the World Version 3 (http://sedac.ciesin.columbia.edu/gpw/), the population dataset and reference year on which Hotspot mortality risk calculations are based. In this way we obtained a single mortality risk value for each country reecting the population at risk of disaster-related mortality per million inhabitants. For each country, these values are comparable to the corresponding value of the DRI, converted as described above. By omitting risks associated with volcanoes, we calculate a Hotspots multi-hazard mortality risk index including only those ve hazards included in the multi-hazard DRI (although landslides are not included in the DRI as a separate hazard, landslide-related

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mortality is included with mortality associated with cyclones and ooding). We obtained the multi-hazard risk gure for each cell by summing the risks associated with the ve hazards as was done for the original six hazards in Dilley et al. (2005, p. 59) and aggregating the results to the country level as described above. 2.3 Methodology for country rank-order comparison Having derived comparable mortality risk values from the original DRI and Hotspots results, we then rank all countries for which a value was available from both studies for each hazard and the multi-hazard indexes. We use Spearmans rank correlation (Hays 1973) to evaluate the degree of correspondence among the resulting country rank orders. We also present the top 25 highest ranked countries for each hazard and the multi-hazard case and identify the highest ranked countries which are common to both the Hotspots and DRI-derived country rank lists. It is important to note that these listings of the top 25 highest ranked countries do not imply that the countries listed have the highest disaster-related mortality risks in the world. Rather they show how high-risk countries common to both analyses compare. The methodologies used by the DRI and Hotspots projects to calculate disaster-related risks, and the above description of the data and methods employed in the comparative analysis, are summarized in Table 3.

3 Results We rank countries based on the mortality risk index derived from the Hotspots project results and then based on the DRI for earthquakes, oods, cyclones, droughts, and the multi-hazard case. Landslide-related risks were incorporated into the Hotspots-based multi-hazard index to account for the fact that they are incorporated in the DRI among the risks associated with cyclones and oods. The country rankings permit us to identify the 25 countries of highest earthquake mortality risk based on indexes derived from the Hotspots and DRI results (Table 4). Countries that are common to both lists are italicized. Less than a third of the top 25 countries appear in both lists. Next, we evaluated the country rank orderings according to ood-related mortality risks (Table 5). For oods, 8 of the 25 highest ranked countries were common to both indexes. Countries at high risk of cyclone related mortality are concentrated in coastal areas (Table 6). More than half of the highest risk countries were ranked in the top 25 according to both indexes. The top 25 countries ranked according to drought related mortality risk levels include many countries in Africa (Table 7). This results in more than half of the countries being common to both lists. Whereas the top 25 countries in the Hotspots-based rankings are exclusively in Africa, the DRI-based list includes countries in Asia and Latin America as well. Finally, we identify the top 25 countries ranked by multi-hazard disaster-related mortality risk based on converted Hotspots and DRI values (Table 8). The multi-hazard rankings include landslidesas a discrete variable from the Hotspots analysis and incorporated in ood and cyclone losses in the list derived from the DRI. Only a quarter of the countries are common to both lists.

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Table 3 Summary of methodology for creating comparable country rank orderings Project Summary of methodologies employed by the two projects evaluated for calculating disaster-related mortality risks DRI 1. Natural hazards include: earthquakes, tropical cyclones, oods and drought 2. Physical exposure calculated using GIS, as the average number of people located in an area exposed to hazard events in a given year 3. Multiple logarithmic regression models used to identify the socioeconomic and environmental variables which, in combination with physical exposure, best reect human vulnerability to each type of hazard (see Table 2) 4. Disaster-related mortality risk for each country is the predicted mortality from the multiple regression equation for each hazard (country vulnerability is illustrated by plotting the number of people killed annually against the degree of hazard exposure from 1980 to 2000) 5. Multi-hazard DRI value for each country obtained summing up risk across all hazards in the country Hotspots 1. Natural hazards include: earthquakes, tropical cyclone, oods, drought, landslides and volcanoes 2. For each hazard, 28 vulnerability coefcients, in the form of historical loss rates calculated using data from EM-DAT, were dened for each of seven geographic regions and four country wealth classes 3. For each hazard, risks of disaster-related mortality and economic losses were calculated based on population and GDP hazard exposure for each 2.50 9 2.50 grid cell weighted by the vulnerability coefcient for the hazard from the region and country wealth class corresponding to that containing the grid cell 4. Grid cells sorted and classied as low (the lowest 40%), medium (the middle 30%) and high risk (the top 30%), or negligible 5. Results displayed as geographic distribution of relative risk 6. Multi-hazard risk calculated proportionally to the contribution to risk of each hazard such that the total mortality in each region adds up to the total recorded in EM-DAT

Raw input for the comparison

Grid cells of the expected Logarithm of killed per million killed population for each hazard population per year for each country and all hazards combined, from each hazard-specic excluding volcanoes for regression model and the multicomparability hazard total 1. Calculate the antilogarithm of the 1. Aggregate the total expected mortality across all grid cells in DRI predicted number of killed each country for the four hazards inhabitants per million of country common with the DRI population per year from the relevant regression equation and the 2. Divide the country Hotspot mortality risk by the number multi-hazard total of millions of inhabitants 2. Convert the result to per million in 2000 population 3. Exclude countries without DRI index values 4. For each country, sum the values for only the hazards in common with the DRI to obtain a comparable multi-hazard value

Creation of comparable mortality risk indexes for country rank orderings

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Table 3 continued
Project Rank orders and top 25 highest-ranked countries DRI Hotspots

For each hazard and the multi-hazard For each hazard and the multi-hazard case: case: 1. Sort countries in descending 1. Sort countries in descending order according to killed per order according to killed per million exposed inhabitants million exposed inhabitants 2. List the top 25 and lowest2. List the top 25 and lowestranked countries ranked countries 3. Italicized countries in common 3. Italicized countries in common with those in the top 25 with those in the top 25 identied based on the DRI identied based on the Hotspots results results For each hazard and the multi-hazard case: 1. Calculate the Spearman Rank Correlation (Hays 1973) between the DRI- and Hotspots-based lists for all countries in common to (not just the top 25) to evaluate the similarity in the country rank orders 2. Identify and discuss causes of similarities and differences in the country rankings

Rank order correlation and analysis

The very high degree of similarity among the top 25 countries ranked according to Hotspots-based drought-related mortality risk in Table 7, and multi-hazard risk here, suggests that drought risks dominate the selection of Hotspots-based multi-hazard mortality risk countries. This suggests that the weighting among hazards is an important consideration in the assessment of overall multi-hazard risks. Finally, we computed the rank-order correlation between the DRI- and Hotspots-based mortality risk country rankings for each hazard and the multi-hazard case over all countries for which there were DRI values (Table 9). All correlations are signicant at the .05 level. The correlation between the countries rankings based on disaster-related mortality risk per million inhabitants varies from moderate in the case of the single hazards to low in the multi-hazard case. Of the single-hazard cases, the degree of correspondence is lowest for earthquakes.

4 Discussion Despite the moderate correlations and the disparities in the top 25 country rankings, we caution readers against concluding that one of the reports is wrong or that neither of them is correct. Rather, these results demonstrate the degree to which data availability and methodological choices affect the overall results. Both of the two reports whose results we analyze here underwent extensive expert review prior to publication. The results and conclusions of both are internally consistent with their respective input datasets and methodologies. Nevertheless, our ndings suggest that methodological and data differences contribute to substantial variation in the results when these results are converted to comparable indexes. Better understanding of the reasons for the differences is important for several reasons. It is important that the audiences for these types of analyses to understand as fully as possible the data and methods on which a given set of results is based. It is also important for risk analysts to be aware of the implications of choices concerning data and methods and to seek to communicate the rationale for these choices, as well as the limits of the analysis, to readers and decision-makers as clearly as possible.

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448 Table 4 Earthquake mortality risk: top 25 countries and last in the ranking

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Rank 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 Last

Based on Hotspots Iraq Syrian Arab Republic Turkey Albania Jordan Kazakhstan Iran (Islamic Republic of) Romania Costa Rica Bulgaria The former Yugoslav Rep. of Macedonia Bosnia Herzegovina Turkmenistan Chile Algeria Antigua and Barbuda Trinidad and Tobago Yugoslavia Nepal Venezuela Dominica Bhutan Saint Kitts and Nevis Tunisia Afghanistan Austria

Based on the DRI Vanuatu Solomon Islands Philippines Papua New Guinea Nicaragua Guam Guatemala Indonesia Costa Rica Chile Japan Ecuador El Salvador Afghanistan Turkey Algeria Peru Colombia Nepal Iran (Islamic Republic of) Greece Mexico Yemen Cyprus Bolivia Brazil

Below, we review some of the general sources of similarities and differences between the DRI and Hotspots project results (Sects. 4.1.14.1.3) and suggest some specic explanations of differences encountered in our country rankings (Sects. 4.2.14.2.4) from the comparative analysis above. 4.1 General factors affecting the results of the comparative analysis The Hotspots and DRI analysis are similar with respect to theory but exhibit signicant differences in terms of data methods. These similarities and differences in turn affect the correlations in Table 9 and the top 25 countries that appear in Tables 48. 4.1.1 Theory Results from the Hotspots and DRI analyses are comparable because they are based on a common theory of disaster causality. Both assume that disaster losses are caused by three sets of factors: the number of elements exposed to each hazard, the frequency of hazard

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Nat Hazards (2009) 48:439456 Table 5 Flood mortality risk: top 25 countries and last in the ranking

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Rank 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 Last

Based on Hotspots Chile Argentina Costa Rica Bangladesh Brazil Venezuela Mexico Trinidad and Tobago Uruguay Jamaica Guatemala Panama Algeria Yemen Paraguay Honduras Colombia El Salvador Nepal Bolivia Tunisia Tajikistan Ecuador Dominican Republic Philippines French Guiana

Based on the DRI Bolivia Paraguay Peru Kazakhstan Kyrgyzstan Ecuador New Zeeland Argentina Honduras Belize Lao Peoples Democratic Republic Benin Chile Mauritania Cambodia Iran (Islamic Republic of) Haiti Nepal Australia Central African republic Jamaica Venezuela Bhutan Brazil Lesotho Luxembourg

events, and the degree of vulnerability of the exposed elements (population in the mortality case) to the hazard.

4.1.2 Data The DRI and Hotspots results incorporate many of the same hazard datasets. Both projects used historical loss data in their calculations, but there were differences in which datasets were used, and how. One data-related factor affecting the results is the period of record. Although much of the data from both projects is from 1980 to 2000, in the Hotspots analysis some datasetse.g., volcanoeshad longer periods of record and two, earthquakes and landslides, were expressed in probabilistic terms rather than as frequencies. The DRI used socio-economic variables in the calculation of vulnerability that were not incorporated in the Hotspots analysis. Although both projects used mortality data from EM-DAT, they used it in fundamentally different ways.

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450 Table 6 Cyclone mortality risk: top 25 countries and last in the ranking

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Rank 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 Last

Based on Hotspots Montserrat Belize Jamaica Dominican Republic Cuba Haiti Bangladesh American Samoa Nicaragua Honduras Antigua and Barbuda St. Vincent and the Grenadines Guatemala Palau Philippines Cape Verde India Saint Kitts and Nevis Dominica Vietnam Madagascar Korea, Dem. Peoples Rep. of Swaziland Vanuatu Lao Peoples Dem. Rep. Somalia

Based on the DRI Mauritius Comoros Bangladesh Haiti Fiji Philippines Dominican Republic Jamaica Lao Peoples Dem. Rep. Guatemala Honduras Belize Madagascar Vietnam El Salvador Sri Lanka India Nicaragua Bahamas Mozambique Cape Verde Republic of Korea Thailand Swaziland Myanmar Colombia

4.1.3 Methods The two projects differ substantially in terms of methods. The unit of analysis in the DRI is the country, whereas the Hotspots project analyzed risks on a 2.50 grid. In the calculation of disaster-related mortality risk, both projects used the analysis of geo-referenced hazard and population exposure as an analytical starting point. They diverged sharply, however, with respect to how vulnerability was incorporated, an important distinction described in more detail below. The two projects also differed in the way they approached the calculation of multi-hazard risk. 4.2 Specic factors affecting the results of the comparative analysis Disaster risk is a function of the magnitude and frequency of hazard events, the degree to which population or other socially important assets are exposed to hazards, and vulnerabilities of the exposed assets that cause them to experience damage when challenged by different hazards. Differences and similarities in data and methods used in the Hotspots and DRI projects are present throughout the calculation of each of these causal steps. In this

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Nat Hazards (2009) 48:439456 Table 7 Drought mortality risk: top 25 countries and last in the ranking

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Rank 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 Last

Based on Hotspots Somalia Zimbabwe Eritrea Lesotho Mauritania Angola Malawi Zambia Mozambique Sierra Leone Ethiopia Sudan Chad Nigeria Niger Mali Senegal United Rep. of Tanzania Gambia Burkina Faso Kenya Guinea-Bissau Benin Guinea Madagascar Suriname

Based on the DRI Afghanistan Ethiopia Chad Cambodia Burkina Faso Mauritania Angola Papua New Guinea Eritrea Kenya Vietnam Nigeria Democratic Republic of Congo Rwanda United Republic of Tanzania Madagascar Zambia Guinea Indonesia Guinea-Bissau Haiti Fiji Malawi Gambia Mozambique El Salvador

section we identify specic instances in which data and methodological differences translate into differences in the results. 4.2.1 Hazards The DRI and Hotspots indexes reect risks associated with four hazards in common: cyclones, drought, earthquakes and oods. In the DRI, landslide losses were combined with those arising from oods and cyclones, however, whereas in Hotspots landslides were considered separately. Differences in the results for oods and cyclones between the Hotspots and DRI-derived country rankings are, therefore, likely inuenced by the fact that landslide losses are mixed in with those arising from oods and cyclones in the DRI case. The cyclone and drought hazard input data were similar, although not identical between the two projects (see the respective reports for detailed explanations of the origins and enhancements to these and other datasets). The ood hazard datasets were differed markedly, however, in that ooded areas were digitized based on disaster events recorded in the EM-DAT database for the DRI whereas Hotspots adapted a ood dataset from the Dartmouth Flood Observatory. It is interesting that the rank correlations for these two hazards were similar, at .56 and .54, respectively, suggesting that in the case of these

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452 Table 8 Multi-hazard mortality risk: top 25 countries and last in the ranking

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Rank Based on Hotspots 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 Last Somalia Zimbabwe Eritrea Lesotho Mauritania Angola Malawi Zambia Montserrat Mozambique Sierra Leone Ethiopia Sudan Chad Nigeria Niger Mali Senegal Belize Gambia Burkina Faso Kenya Iraq Jamaica French Guiana

Based on the DRI Afghanistan Ethiopia Chad Bolivia Paraguay Cambodia Mauritius Peru Philippines Kazakhstan Kyrgyzstan Comoros Haiti Ecuador Bangladesh New Zealand Burkina Faso Fiji Mauritania Papua New Guinea Lao Peoples Democratic Republic Nicaragua Belize Jamaica Antigua and Barbuda

United Rep. of Tanzania Honduras

Table 9 Spearman correlation of country rankings based on DRI and Hotspots mortality risk index for N common countries (the DRI ood and cyclone-based rankings also reect risks associated with landslides)

Hazard Flood Drought Cyclones Earthquake Multi-hazard

R .54 .47 .56 .41 .31

N 123 73 35 54 153

hazards differences in the hazard data alone do not necessarily overwhelmingly affect the degree of correspondence in the country rankings. Only eight out of the top 25 countries ranked according to ood were common to both indexes, however, compared with 15 for cyclones. Likely reasons for this are twofold; while some of the lack of commonality in the top 25 ranked countries for ooding may be due to the fact that the two studies used entirely different ood hazard data, a much smaller number of countries is affected by cyclones globally (n = 35 in the comparative analysis).

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The smaller number of cyclone cases ensures a higher degree of correspondence among the top 25 countries. Another signicant difference between the two analyses can be found in the treatment of earthquakes. The DRI used observed earthquakes over a 21-year period. In the Hotspots analysis, earthquake-related risks were based on probabilities of Peak Ground Acceleration (PGA) exceedance estimated by the Global Seismic Hazard Assessment Program (GSHAP). The GSHAP analysis (http://www.seismo.ethz.ch/GSHAP/) uses the empirical space-time distribution of earthquake occurrence to develop a probabilistic estimate of maximum ground shaking at each point. The Hotspots project dened the earthquake hazard as a 10% probability of exceedance of PGA greater than 2 m/s2 in 50 years with a 475-year return period (Dilley et al. 2005, p. 30). This differencebetween observed earthquakes over 21 years versus exceedance probabilitiesmay help to explain the fact that the degree of correspondence among the country rankings was lowest for earthquakes among all the other single hazards. Earthquakes recurrence intervals are typically much greater than 21 years, which means that the DRI results for earthquakes are more affected by the shortness of the observational record. 4.2.2 Exposure In the calculation of the DRI and Hotspots disaster-related mortality risk indexes, physical exposure refers to the number of people (and GDP per unit area in the Hotspots economic loss risk case) combined with the frequency and or the probability of hazard events at each location. In order to calculate relative mortality risks, both analyses begin by calculating the population hazard exposure for each grid cell in the Gridded Population of the World (GPW) dataset. An important difference in the calculation of exposure that could affect the results in Tables 48 is the fact that the DRI pro-rated population annually from 1980 to 2000 when calculating exposure whereas all Hotspots exposure calculations are based on 2000 population. This means that the DRI exposure gures are based on estimated actual population at the time of historically recorded hazard events whereas Hotspots effectively assumes that each event occurred in 2000 for the purposes of calculating the relative number of people that would be affected in one place versus another. This fundamental difference in the two methodologies carried over into our comparative analysis as well, and therefore, likely affected the degree of correspondence among the country rankings. 4.2.3 Vulnerability Many of the differences we note in the comparative analysis relate to how vulnerability was calculated. Signicant differences in how vulnerability was incorporated into the calculation of risk in the DRI and Hotspots analyses extend to both data and methods. The Hotspots analysis did not use national level socio-economic statistics to represent vulnerability, so the entire dataset of 24 socio-economic variables used to evaluate vulnerability in the calculation of the DRI is unique to the DRI. Conversely, although both analyses incorporated observed historical disaster-related mortality data from EM-DAT, they used this data in fundamentally different ways. In the DRI, EM-DAT observed mortality was used as the basis for selection of vulnerability variables within a regression modelindependent variables that resulted in the highest (plausible) correlation between observed and predicted losses. In Hotspots, EM-DAT observed mortality was used directly in the calculation of vulnerabilityby identifying historical loss rates associated with each

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hazard for different combinations of regions and country wealth groupings. This difference certainly affected the calculation of mortality risk levels, although to an unknown degree. The effect of differences in the calculation of drought-related vulnerability is particularly clear. Among the four DRI regression models, drought was the only hazard for which physical exposure did not explain the majority of the variation in observed mortality. This means that the resulting drought mortality risks reect vulnerability factors to an exceptional degree. Hotspots drought vulnerability estimates, on the other hand, were greatly affected by huge drought-related mortality events recorded in EM-DAT in Africa in the 1970s and 1980s involving hundreds of thousands of people per event. Thus, all of the Hotspots-based top 25 countries in Table 7 are African whereas the top 25 DRI-based countries include some from Asia and Latin America as well. 4.2.4 Risk The cumulative effects of hazard dataset selection, annualized versus constant (reference year 2000-based) population exposure, and the representation of vulnerability, propagate into the overall calculation of risk. Although we do not separate the effects of these differences on the overall results, the single biggest consistent difference between the two methodologies and datasets appears to reside in the calculation of vulnerability. While the hazard datasets and the calculation of physical exposure had much in common between the two projects, vulnerability calculations involved either entirely different datasets in the two analyses, and when the same data was used it was used in entirely different ways. This suggests that the moderate correlations we obtained when comparing country rankings across the hazards reect differences in how vulnerability was represented in each case. Another clear example of the effect of methodology on risk results can be found in Table 8, which contains multi-hazard country risk rankings derived from the DRI and Hotspots indexes. In the Hotspots case, drought clearly dominates the country rank order. All of the countries in the top 25 but three are in Africa, consistent with the Hotspots-based results for drought (Table 7) and unlike the results for earthquakes, oods and cyclones (Tables 46). In the Hotspots case the high number of deaths in EM-DAT for drought events in Africa has evidently caused drought-related mortality risks to be both: (a) signicantly higher for African countries than in other regions, as well as (b) higher than for other hazards in all regions. The DRI-derived rankings for drought in Table 7 are more regionally balanced. Only 3 of the top 25 countries on the DRI side of multi-hazard Table 8 are in mainland Africa, and only 10 of the top 25 countries in Table 8 (multi-hazard) also appear in Table 7 (drought). This demonstrates that in the DRI case drought does not dominate the other hazards in terms of its contribution to multi-hazard mortality risk globally to the same extent as is true with Hotspots. As drought is often viewed by disaster specialists as a particularly problematic hazard, clearly additional work is needed in order to better assess its contribution to overall multi-hazard risk globally.

5 Conclusions Hard evidence about risk levels and risk factors is vital for prioritizing and implementing disaster risk reduction and transfer measures. A diversity of methods and a variety of ways of representing disaster risk is both valuable and necessary for addressing the needs of

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different risk management constituencies. At the same time, our comparison based on the results of two inuential global risk analyses suggests that continued work is needed to ensure that, when different perspectives on risk offer alternative views, these views are of a common risk landscape. Conclusions and recommendations along these lines include: (1) Review of methodologies: Further work related to the assessment of global risk should pay particular attention to decisions regarding methodology, as our ndings here suggest that the results are particularly sensitive to methodological choices. It would be benecial to explore the extent to which a hybrid methodology could be developed combining elements of the Hotspots and DRI analyses so that further methodological improvements could proceed along a single track rather than in parallel. Further synthesis of existing research results: Recognizing that decision-making requirements, not to mention data limitations, necessitate multiple methods for assessing particular types of risks to particular elements at particular scales, further review of the methods and results discussed here, as well as others developed for use on national-local scales, could yield a methodological toolkit for measuring various aspects of disaster risk in support of various risk management applications without sacricing theoretical rigor. This toolkit would assist with more systematically answering different risk-related questions and supporting different types of risk management decisions, while avoiding a multiplicity of un- or under-theorized methods whose results do not qualify as evidence. This process could help to promote further development and adoption of improved methods and harmonization of results. Improvements in the database: The quality of data is extremely important. Many of the variations among the results we encountered stem from variations in the input data. Sound risk analysis requires continued cooperation and commitment for collection and exchange of good quality data within and among countries. In the long run there is a need for a long-term commitment and procedures for data collection and standardization. It is important to identify and dene the minimum set of input, output, and variables for data collection for particular decision-support applications. Improvements in data and methods for evaluating vulnerability: Our results suggest that vulnerability data limitations, and associated methodological choices, may have been the biggest contributor to differences in country rankings by two otherwise similar analyses. For larger scale work, data on the attributes of sector-specic elements at riskinfrastructure and productive land uses and assetswill especially be needed to improve risk calculations. Given the multiple uses that historical loss data was employed for in the analyses reviewed here, and due to its importance overall in risk assessment, on-going improvement in global, national and local disaster loss database is critical. Improvements in the calculation of multi-hazard risk: Hazard events are often linked, with cyclones triggering heavy rainfall, which in turn can trigger ooding and landslides. Attribution of losses to any particular hazard is often difcult, therefore, and it is difcult to avoid double-counting when assessing multiple hazard-related risks. The fact that the greatest differences were found in the multi-hazard rankings suggest that methods for calculating risks associated with multiple hazards is a priority area for further research. Bridging the gap between static and dynamic vulnerability assessment: The Hotspots and DRI vulnerability analysis and results are based on historical data. As risk factors change with time, there will be a continuing need for on-going revision of the global risk panorama. Dynamic factors such as urbanization, economic growth,

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environmental degradation and climate change will necessitate periodic updates, for which historical data may be only partially a guide. Sustained follow-up: Our results, and the impacts of the studies we evaluated on both development policy and practice, suggest that the time is ripe to begin to systematically promote the formation of a global community of risk identication practice. This would provide a vehicle for on-going revision of results, greater participation by a larger range of experts, including from developing countries, where better risk analyses are urgently needed.

Acknowledgments We are grateful to Gregory Yetman and Randolph Pullen from the Center for International Earth Science Information Network (CIESIN) at the Earth Institute of Columbia University for providing the raw Hotspots data in a timely manner. We also wish to thank Pascal Peduzzi, Christian Herold and Hy Dao from the UNEP/DEWA/GRID Geneva for providing the raw mortality risk data from the DRI project. Two anonymous reviewers made helpful comments that substantially strengthened the paper. Any errors of fact or interpretation are the sole responsibility of the authors.

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