Reflections on Hazard Risk and Vulnerability Assessments

In Disaster Management, assessing risks is foundational towards ‘preparing’ for a disaster and ‘mitigating’ the impacts of a disaster.

Intuitively, we all understand risk. Shopping during a pandemic is a high-risk activity, depending on one’s age (vulnerability) and the places visited (exposure). Building a resort on the floodplains of the Ganga is ‘risky’. Being born in a BPL family in Dharbanga puts you at a higher risk from floods than being born into a middle-class family in Mumbai, a city that also experiences inundation.

Risk, thus, is contingent on the hazards, the underlying vulnerabilities of the population, and the exposure of the population to the hazards.

In the public policy space, an intuitive understanding of risk has few takers. When financial allocations are to be made, infrastructure to be built, and pubic finance to be safeguarded from losses, risk calls for quantification and rigour. (For example, in the insurance industry, the pricing of products is contingent on the underlying risks. Risk assessments are the industry’s bread and butter. The mathematics and probabilistic modelling are what lead to the launch of innovative products and price discovery.)

And in this fact lies a conundrum. How do we balance an intuitive understanding of risk that may prod us towards common-sensical approaches against being swamped by the mathematics of risk assessments that may lead to decision paralysis. A common lament one hears at the district-level is that ‘we haven’t spent any resources on risk mitigation and preparedness because we haven’t conducted a risk assessment. And we can’t carry out a risk assessment since it’s a very complex undertaking.’  As an exhibit, see the sample indicators that are typically required for a disaster risk assessment:

• Hazards: Historical datasets for cyclones, floods, storm surges, lightning, droughts, heat waves, earthquakes, tsunamis, coastal erosion, land subsidence, landslides, industrial accidents, chemical leaks, fires, epidemics, pandemics, livestock diseases, sea-level rise, salinity intrusion,
• Vulnerability: Physical: structural integrity of built infrastructure, Social: socio-economic conditions, education, gender, disability, caste/tribal vulnerabilities. Economic: dependence on climate-sensitive livelihoods, access to credit/insurance. Environmental: degradation of ecosystems, water scarcity, biodiversity loss.
• Exposure: Population, Built environment (housing stock, schools, hospitals, cyclone shelters, heritage sites), Infrastructure (roads, bridges, utilities, coastal embankments, ports), Livelihoods (agriculture, fisheries, tourism, industry), Environmental assets (mangroves, wetlands, forests, biodiversity).

These indicators are not exhaustive. Any expert can pick holes, question the absence of certain ‘key’ indicators and dismiss the whole exercise right at the drawing stage. In a recent interaction with a risk assessment expert to understand the possibility of a low-cost, multi-district exercise, I was caught off-guard when told that without building-level plinth information, no flood risk assessment would be complete. Both he and I had the same ‘Surely, you are joking’ expression for a few seconds. The Risk Assessment community and the Disaster Management community are not always on the same page.

At the same time, I have also heard administrators arguing for the use of appropriate proxies that can reduce costs, complexity, and the timeframe for risk assessments. For instance, can the Multi-Dimensional Poverty Index be good enough for the Vulnerability layer; can GDP be a proxy for exposure and can hazard information be standardized nationally? While such approaches may not be perfect, they could be a base to start with. Districts, cities, and states could further build on these as time goes. As the adage goes, ‘Don’t let Perfect be the enemy of the Good’.

Postscript:

Way back in 1946, when risk assessments were not even a thing, Borges wrote a short story (in fact its just a paragraph) called ‘On Exactitude in Science’. The story describes an empire where cartographers make maps so detailed that they eventually create a map the size of the empire itself (A 1:1 scale map!). Over time, the giant map becomes useless and falls into ruins, while people return to simpler forms of mapping. In the story lies some important lessons for us:

• The map is not the territory
• Exactitude can lead to absurdity
• Simplicity endures

The story is reproduced here:

…In that Empire, the Art of Cartography attained such Perfection that the map of a single Province occupied the entirety of a City, and the map of the Empire, the entirety of a Province. In time, those Unconscionable Maps no longer satisfied, and the Cartographers Guilds struck a Map of the Empire whose size was that of the Empire, and which coincided point for point with it. The following Generations, who were not so fond of the Study of Cartography as their Forebears had been, saw that that vast Map was Useless, and not without some Pitilessness was it, that they delivered it up to the Inclemencies of Sun and Winters. In the Deserts of the West, still today, there are Tattered Ruins of that Map, inhabited by Animals and Beggars; in all the Land there is no other Relic of the Disciplines of Geography.

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Some Questions worth pondering

1. The end-purpose must drive the scale and detail of a Risk Assessment. How do we conceptualize assessments for such ‘multiple’ end users?
2. What institutional mechanisms are needed to ensure that the findings of risk assessments actually feed into planning, budgeting, and project approvals?
3. What role can communities themselves play in generating data for risk assessments, and how do we validate such citizen-generated data?
4. Can we design a tiered methodology—basic, intermediate, advanced—so that districts with limited resources can still undertake risk assessments and gradually build sophistication over time?
5. Regions with a high socio-economic vulnerability may not have a high exposure or be prone to hazards. On the other hand, regions with high exposure may be more at ‘risk’ but overall less vulnerable from a socio-economic point of view. How should the Political Economy analysis of this issue be done?

While much of this may sound technical or abstract, a risk assessment well-done can lead to better preparedness — and ultimately, a life saved. And that is always worth striving for.

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