Government Investment in Disaster Risk Reduction Based on a Probabilistic Risk Model: A Case Study of Typhoon Disasters in Shenzhen, China

In recent years, cost-benefit analysis(CBA) has played an important role in disaster risk reduction(DRR)investment decisions, and now increasing attention is being paid to its application in developing countries. This article discusses government investment choices in DRR against typhoon disasters in Shenzhen, China. While the existing literature mainly focuses on disaster mitigation measures such as structural retrofitting, this study proposes a holistic framework of DRR investments in which structural(windproof retrofitting) and financial(insurance premium subsidies and post-disaster relief) are all taken into account.In particular, intermeasure spillover effects are measured and used in CBA. The results show that insurance premium subsidies yield the highest benefit-cost ratio and should be prioritized in investment. Windproof retrofitting comes in second place in terms of the benefit-cost ratio and can be considered when there is a sufficient budget. These results further confirm the need of a holistic review of government DRR investments to derive policy recommendations, while challenges remain in relation to the probabilistic modeling capacity to support CBA.

TYPHOON DISASTER AND ITS RISK ASSESSMENTIN CHINA

On the basis of the typhoon disaster data from 1989 to 1994, this thesisanalyzes the main features of typhoon disaster in China, and makes its risk assessment.It concludes that the typhoon disaster has brought about the most serious damages in Zhejiang and Guangdong Provinces. Generally, typhoon occurs from May to October in China,most from July to September, mainly in August. Annual variation of typhoon disaster is consistent with annual variation of landing typhoon number.With the economy development in coastal area,the economic loss of disaster also rises.Risk assessment shows that Zhejiang and Guangdong Provinces areprone to high possibility of typhoons, the anti-typhoon disaster ability of Zhejiang and Hainan Provinces is relatively low

Hazard Footprint-Based Normalization of Economic Losses from Tropical Cyclones in China During 1983–2015

Loss normalization is the prerequisite for understanding the effects of socioeconomic development,vulnerability, and climate changes on the economic losses from tropical cyclones. In China, limited studies have been done on loss normalization methods of damages caused by tropical cyclones, and most of them have adopted an administrative division-based approach to define the exposure levels. In this study, a hazard footprint-based normalization method was proposed to improve the spatial resolution of affected areas and the associated exposures to influential tropical cyclones in China. The meteorological records of precipitation and near-surface wind speed were used to identify the hazard footprint of each influential tropical cyclone. Provincial-level and national-level(total)economic loss normalization(PLN and TLN) were carried out based on the respective hazard footprints, covering loss records between 1999–2015 and 1983–2015, respectively.Socioeconomic factors—inflation, population, and wealth(GDP per capita)—were used to normalize the losses. A significant increasing trend was found in inflation-adjusted losses during 1983–2015, while no significant trend was found after normalization with the TLN method. The proposed hazard footprint-based method contributes to amore realistic estimation of the population and wealth affected by the influential tropical cyclones for the original year and the present scenario.