Phillipines - MHZ Flashcards
What is the area of the phillipines
Over 7600 islands in south east asia
Area of 300,000 square km
Population
100 million peopme
Wealth of the phillipines
Fourth richest economy in the world
Newly industrilised country
Large imbalance in the distribution of wealth with 21.6% of population mainly in rural areas below the poverty line
Landscape
Mountains - contributes to vulnerability
Bays, coves, inlets - mailai bay
Numerous rivers - cagayan river, agusan river, crucial role in irrigation transportation and a source of fresh water for communities
Tropical climate
Monsoon wet and dry season - sw monsoon heavy rains june to october whilst ne cooler dryer air from november to feb
22,000 miles of coastline exposure of population
Tectonic vulnerability as a MHZ volcanoes
Position on the western rim of the pacific ring of fire brings both earthquakes and volcanic activity, with secondary impacts such as lahars
23 Active volcanoes sites;
Mayon
Pinatubo
Taal
Atmosphereic vulnerability
The typhoon belt in the westen pacific lead to storm hazards e.g. typhoon haiyan 2013
Hydrological vulnerability as mhz
Storms bring a great deal of flooding and threat of landslides, adds to the hazardoues nature of life in these islands
High level of rainfall increases level of landslides
Vulnerability in a human context
The philippines physical vulnerability hinders the attempts by government to reduce the incidence of poverty and to reduce the number of people and assets vulnerable to these hazards
The cost to the phillipine economy has been estimated at 0.5% of national gdp and indirect and secondary impacts further increase this cost
Social and environmental impacts
In past 2 decades over 300 hazards - typhoons increased due to climate change
Over past 2 decades filipinos have flicked to risk low lying areas havens for cheap crowded housing clear link between poverty and vulnerabiliy to natural disasters
Rapid urbanisarion has exacerbated the problem with tightly placed flimsy built housing and environmental degration such as - rapid and unplanned particularly in metro manila lack basic services with nearly 26 m people living here
22,000 m of coastline put exposed population at risk to sea level rise and coastal erosion
Management of the hazards
The philippines institutional arrangements and disaster management systems have tended to rely on a response or reactive approach when they should be taking a more effective proactive response approach in which disaster can be mitigated even avoided by appropriate land use planning, construction and other preventative measures which avoid the creation of disaster prone conditions
Widespread emphasis on post disaster releif and short term preparedness forecasting/evacuation rather than on mitigation and post disaster support of disaster prone conditions
The current system tends to be more of a centralised top down administrative system than one which is community based and gives rise to local initiatives
What is required is inititaices which emphasise the bottom up approach that will help the most vulnerable communities cope with the hazards when they occur
The phillipines National Red Cross have started programmes at community level with the aim to reduce the impacts of natural disasters by encouraging people to collborate in protecting their lives and the resource upon which they depend
Plans include; Co-operation and partnership with government, bodies in order to gain financial support for mitigation measures and to ensure that the programmes have long term stability, training local volunteers in disaster management, identifying risk through land use mapping, initiating mitigation measures which could be physical health relath or planning tools and dissemination of information to the whole community
Fillipions have great resilience in living in disaster prone atea Whilst others have described it as a fatalistic perspective
The united nations calims that the philippines has some of the best risk reduction laws in the world but unfortunately most of these are still on paper
With a country of over 7600 islands too much responsibilities for reducing disaster risk falls to local govt where money is not always spent wisley
Recent govt legislation calls for 70% of disaster spending to be used on long term plans with only 30% going on emergency aid
Resources are stretched in a mhz even before the country could recover from one disaster theres a new one
Tectonic vulnerability eqs
Tectonic vulnerability storms
