As the US finally concedes that global warming is happening, dramatic new data is emerging on the impact of "natural" disasters. Neither rich nor poor countries can escape. But the biggest question raised is for the developing world. After a decade of UN conferences designed to end poverty and save the world, disasters driven by global warming are causing catastrophe for the poor majority and political and economic insecurity for the rest.
Although the number of people killed by disasters has fallen by more than half over the past three decades, the number affected - a definition which includes being injured or made homeless - has grown enormously. According to the World Disasters Report, it is up from 740 million in the 1970s to more than two billion in the past decade (these figures include some double counting due to people being repeatedly affected). Reported economic losses, calculated at current values, have risen from $131bn in the 1970s to $629bn in the 1990s. Actual losses are greater. The number of reported disasters rose from 1,110 to 2,742 in the period. I
In regions such as Oceania in the past 30 years, the number affected has increased 65-fold. Yet in all the international political efforts to agree targets for reducing poverty and protecting the environment - now focused on the so-called millennium development goals - no one has taken serious account of the increasing impact of disasters. Heads of state will go to Johannesburg this summer to make the millennium goals a reality.
Although the number of people killed by disasters has fallen by more than half over the past three decades, the number affected - a definition which includes being injured or made homeless - has grown enormously. According to the World Disasters Report, it is up from 740 million in the 1970s to more than two billion in the past decade (these figures include some double counting due to people being repeatedly affected). Reported economic losses, calculated at current values, have risen from $131bn in the 1970s to $629bn in the 1990s. Actual losses are greater. The number of reported disasters rose from 1,110 to 2,742 in the period. I
In regions such as Oceania in the past 30 years, the number affected has increased 65-fold. Yet in all the international political efforts to agree targets for reducing poverty and protecting the environment - now focused on the so-called millennium development goals - no one has taken serious account of the increasing impact of disasters. Heads of state will go to Johannesburg this summer to make the millennium goals a reality.