Socio-economic vulnerability to natural hazards – proposal for an indicator-based model

摘要

The severity of a natural hazard impact on a society depends, among others on the intensityrnof the hazard and vulnerability factors like the number, and resistance of exposed elements (e.g. persons,rnbuildings and infrastructure). Social conditions strongly influence the vulnerability factors both forrndirect and indirect impact and therefore have the power to transform the occurrence of a natural hazardrninto a natural disaster.rnThis paper presents a model, using an indicator-based methodology, to assess relative socio-economicrnvulnerability to landslides. The indicators represent the underlying factors which influence a community’srnability to deal with, and recover from the damage associated with landslides. The proposed model includesrnindicators which represent demographic, economic and social characteristics as well as indicatorsrnrepresenting the degree of preparedness and recovery capacity. Although this model focuses primarily onrnthe indirect losses, it could easily be extended to include more physical indicators which account for therndirect losses. Each indicator is individually ranked from 1 (lowest vulnerability) to 5 (highest vulnerability)rnand weighted, based on its overall degree of influence. The final vulnerability estimate is formulatedrnas a weighted average of the individual indicator scores. Application of the proposed model is shown forrna Norwegian community.