VULNERABILITY

Part 2
VULNERABILITY vs EXPOSURE
“While most natural hazards may be inevitable, disasters are not”
1. While vulnerability describes a propensity to incur consequences,
2. Exposure merely suggests that the individual, structure, community, nation, or other
subject will be confronted by the forces associated with that particular hazard.

Types of Vulnerabilities
There are generally four different types of vulnerabilities:
1. Physical vulnerabilities
2. Social vulnerabilities
3. Economic vulnerabilities
4. Environmental vulnerabilities
Physical vulnerability
1. The interaction between living things, structures, material objects, systems, and the
physical forces of hazards. It include geography, infrastructure, and populations
 2. Geography- Natural make up like coastal cities, Slopping settlement, seismic fault etc.
3. Infrastructure- Earthquake resilient building, NDRF team infrastructure, Hospital etc.
4. Population – Movement, Presence, Density etc.
The following list provides geographic profile:
• Land cover (vegetation)
• Soil type
• Topography
• Slope
• Aspect (the direction something such as a mountain slope faces)
• Water resources (lakes, rivers, streams, reservoirs, etc.)
• Wetlands and watersheds
• Seismic faults
• Climate (wind, rainfall, temperature)
The infrastructure component of the physical profile focuses primarily on the
interaction between people and the land.
• Land use
• Location and construction material of homes
• Location and construction material of businesses
• Zoning and building code delineations
• Critical infrastructure components
• Hospitals and clinics
• Oil and gas transport pipelines
• Oil and gas storage facilities
• Transportation systems
• Roads and highways
• Railroads
• Airports
• Public transportation systems
• Waterways and port facilities
• Government and other public facilities
• Prisons and jail facilities
• Power generation facilities and transmission
• Water purification facilities and pipes
• Wastewater treatment and sewer lines
• Gas lines
Physical vulnerabilities vary depending on the time as population movements
occur, profile include:
• Population by jurisdiction (i.e., county, city)
• Population distribution within a county or city
• Population concentrations
• Animal populations
• Locations of schools, major employers, and financial centers
• Areas of high-density residential and commercial development
• Recreational areas and facilities
Why 2008 Sichuan Earthquake was disastrous?

Social vulnerability
1. The social makeup of the population found within a planning area has a strong influence
on disaster vulnerability.
2. Aspects of the social profile are diverse and comprise education, culture, government,
social interaction, values, laws, and beliefs, among others.
3. In 2001, when an earthquake struck in Gujarat, India, killing more than 20,000 people
(primarily as result of residential structure failure), not a single bhunga collapsed.
Factors to consider in scoping a social profile include:
Religions
Age breakdown
Gender-related issues
Literacy
Language
Health
Politics
Security
Human rights
Government and governance (including social services)
Social equality and equity
Traditional values
Customs
Culture
Gujrat earthquake 2001
 Bhungas

Tonga sabbath law

Environmental vulnerability
How health and welfare of the natural environment within the area of study factors into the
propensity of the affected population to incur disaster consequences.
Example- Poor environmental practices, such as deforestation, a lack of land-use planning,
and management of hazardous materials.
Features of a community’s natural environment profile include,
• Health of waterways (rivers, streams, creeks, etc.)
• Status of wetlands
• Management of lakes
• Management of forests
• Health of coastal dunes
• Health of coral reefs
• Human practices that affect the environmental profile of a country include:
• Diking or damming rivers and creeks
• Filling in wetlands for development
• Channeling coastal areas such that marsh and wetlands areas are destroyed
• Clear-cutting forests
• Mismanaging forests such that deadwood builds up (serving as fuel for a forest fire)
• Destroying coastal dunes
Economic vulnerability
The financial means of individuals, towns, cities, communities, or whole countries to protect
themselves from the effects of disasters.
Economic measures that inform vulnerability assessments include:
Gross domestic product
Debt or Access to credit
Insurance coverage
Sources of national income
Availability of disaster reserve funds
Social distribution of wealth
Prevalence of business continuity planning
Economic diversity (the range of products and resources that drive the economy)
Philanthropic giving

RISK FACTORS THAT INFLUENCE VULNERABILITY

1. Urbanization and
2. Rural livelihoods
Urbanization
1. In addition to concentrating populations, urbanization concentrates national wealth and
resources into small, often vulnerable pockets
 2. Several reasons why urbanization contributes to risk and vulnerability
3. Risk by origin
4. Increasing physical exposure
5. Social exclusion
6. Modification and generation of hazard patterns.
7. Urbanization of new regions
8. Access to loss mitigation mechanisms.
Rural Livelihoods
1. Rural poverty
2. Environmental degradation- Deforestation, overgrazing of land, poor farming practices,
and alteration of waterways
3. Non-diversified economies
4. Isolation and remoteness.