Disaster Reduction and Sustainable Development: Understanding the Links between Vulnerability and Risk to Disasters Related to Development and Environment

I. Disaster Impact on Development
4. During the past four decades, natural hazards such as earthquakes, volcanic activity, landslides, tsunamis, tropical cyclones and other severe storms, tornadoes and high winds, river floods and coastal flooding, wildfires and associated haze, drought, sand/dust storms, and insect infestations have caused major loss of human lives and livelihoods, the destruction of economic and social infrastructure, as well as environmental damage. Economic losses have increased almost 10 times⁴ during this period. In recent years, floods in Algeria, Bangladesh, Ethiopia, Guinea, India, Mozambique, Nigeria, Sudan, Thailand, Venezuela and Vietnam, volcanic eruptions in Ecuador, Democratic Republic of Congo, Indonesia, Montserrat, and the Philippines, and earthquakes in Afghanistan, El Salvador, India, Indonesia, Japan, Peru and Turkey, have created widespread social, economic and environmental destruction. In some cases, natural disasters can amplify man-made emergencies or vice versa, as epitomized by the drought, earthquakes and unfolding events in Afghanistan.