Chapter 1

Introduction

It is now a globally accepted paradigm that the nature of vulnerability and the magnitude of risk are intimately connected to the poverty because the poor have been the most vulnerable and their level of risk to the natural hazards is relatively high. It is also presumed that the poverty can contribute towards enhancing the disaster risk with lesser capability to recover fast and recoup to the damages inflicted on them. Significant social and economic consequences of major recent natural hazards in different parts of the world have reiterated the need to place hazard concerns higher on the global poverty agenda. Thus understanding the nature and magnitude of poverty and its relation with disaster risk at different levels can be useful information for the disaster managers.

The profiling of the disaster risk and poverty linkages can enhance the understanding of disasters and the nature of human development. This can also pave the way for production of information from the local and regional levels to track the disaster impacts for mainstreaming a disaster information system.

Disaster has become now an annual feature in India, natural and not natural. The calamity becomes a tragedy when it strikes the poor region, which has the least capability to cope with it financially and human resource wise, coupled with poor governance. Floods and droughts have become annual features with a huge loss of life and property, damage to ecology, and adversely affecting development interventions. The evidence presented will make the case for hazard risk reduction as a key instrument to reduce poverty and for poverty reduction strategies in turn, to contribute to reducing people’s susceptibility to hazard events.

1.1 Disasters-The Indian Scenario

Many regions in India are highly vulnerable to natural and other disasters on account of geological conditions. About 60 per cent of the landmass is susceptible to earthquakes and over 8% is prone to floods. Of the nearly 7500 kilometers long coastline, approximately 5700 kilometers is prone to cyclones. 68 per cent area is susceptible to drought. All this entails huge economic losses and causes developmental setbacks. Disasters are no longer limited to natural catastrophes. Man-made emergencies often cause bigger disasters in terms of fatalities and economic losses. With urbanization and concentration of population in metropolitan cities, more and more people are becoming vulnerable to locational disasters. So, the development process needs to be sensitive towards disaster prevention, preparedness and mitigation. Disaster management has therefore emerged as a high priority for the country. Going beyond the historical focus on relief and rehabilitation after the event, there is a need to look ahead and plan for disaster

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preparedness and mitigation in order to ensure that periodic shocks to our development efforts are minimized.

India supports one-sixth of the world’s population on just 2 per cent of its landmass. It suffers heavily from natural disasters of every shade and description that hits the poorest of the poor and which is why the considerations of disaster safety deserves prime attention.

A High Powered Committee ( HPC) of the Government of India, in its report submitted to the Government of India in October 2001, outlined the huge scope for Disaster Management by listing some three dozen different types of disasters India must prepare for. These were placed in five categories, namely, water and climate related disasters, geological disasters, chemical, industrial and nuclear disasters, accidents and biological disasters (See technical notes). Of these, earthquakes, floods, cyclones and landslides rank among the most feared disasters in India, and the fear is naturally heightened in the areas affected by multiple hazards.

India is prone to many types of disasters. The ones that have large impacts are:1 Tsunami2 Earthquake3 Cyclone4 Floods5 Droughts6 Landslides7 Forest Fires

Table 1.1: Key Vulnerabilities India Exposed to Annually/ Periodically Across Various Regions

Disaster Vulnerable States/ Regions 1 Tsunami* Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Pondicherry and Andaman & Nicobar

Islands2 Earthquake Across the country with moderate – high intensity (over

65% of the areas of India is vulnerable to earthquake)3 Cyclones Coastal areas – particularly in East coast & Gujarat4 Floods Indo-Gangetic plains and Brahamaputra basin (approx

comprises 40 million hectares prone to floods)Droughts Across the country (approx 68% of cropped area affected)

5 Forest Fires Himalayan Forests6 Landslides Sub-Himalayan region & western Ghats in particular* Tsunami has been only one time event. It struck in 2004.

TsunamiTsunami has been one time disaster in the recent memory. It affected the southern parts of eastern coast of India, the states of Tamil Nadu, Kerala and Pondicherry and Union Territory of Andaman and Nicobar. The impact of this disaster was: 12,405 people dead, 3.5 million houses damaged and 18 million people affected1.

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EarthquakesIndia has witnessed some of the most devastating earthquakes during the last century: in Kangra (1905), Bihar-Nepal (1934) and in Assam (1950). In the recent past, major earthquakes have been in in Uttarkashi (1991), Latur (1993), Jabalpur (1997), Chamoli (1999) and in Bhuj (2001). The Bhuj earthquake, 6.9 on the Richer scale, affected the entire state, resulting in 13,805 death, damaging 1.8 million houses and affecting 12 million people2. In Ahmedabad City 150 multi-storey buildings crumbled3. (Annexure 1.1 gives the regionwise frequency of earthquake occurrence).

Map 1.1: Earthquake prone Region, India

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Map 1.2: Wind and Cyclone Hazard Map, India

CyclonesCyclones in India generally strike the East Coast; some of the Arabian Sea Cyclones strike the west coast of India as well mainly the Gujarat and North Maharashtra coast. Out of the storms that develop in the Bay of Bengal, over 58 percent approach or cross the east coast in October and November. India has a very long coastline of 8041 km, large parts of which are vulnerable to cyclone. Information on some of the major cyclones in recent years is given in Annexure 1.2.

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BoxIndependent India’s 15 most devastating floods

Year States/ region affected Deaths2005 Maharashtra (Mumbai, Raigad) 1,0002000 West Bengal, Bihar, Gujarat, Andhra Pradesh, Assam, Arunachal

Pradesh, Bihar, Himachal Pradesh, Kerala, Madhya Pradesh, Punjab, Uttar Pradesh

2,174

1998 Assam, Arunachal Pradesh, Bihar, Kerala, Meghalays, Punjab, Sikkim, Uttar Pradesh, West Bengal

1,811

1997 Andhra Pradesh, Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, Bihar, Gujarat, Himachal Pradesh, Jammu & Kashmir, Karnataka, Kerala, Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, Orissa, Punjab, Rajasthan, Sikkim, Uttar Pradesh, West Bengal

1,422

1995 Bihar, Haryana, Jammu & Kashmir, Punjab, Uttar Pradesh, West Bengal, Maharashtra

1,479

1994 Assam, Arunachal Pradesh, Jammu & Kashmir, Himachal Pradesh, Punjab, Uttar Pradesh, Goa, Kerala, Gujarat

2,001

1993 Punjab, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, Gujarat, Jammu & Kashmir, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Assam

827

1989 Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh, Gujarat 1,5911988 Uttar Pradesh, Assam, Bihar, West Bengal, Arunachal Pradesh,

Punjab, Himachal Pradesh, Haryana, Jammu & Kashmir, Delhi1,850

1987 Assam, Bihar, West Bengal 1,2001982 Northeast 9321980 Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Gujarat, Kerala, Haryana 1,6001978 North, Northeast 3,8001971 North India 1,0231961 North India 2,000

Source: DNA, August 29, 2008.

FloodsFloods are result of the fact that in India, 75 per cent of the total annual rainfall is received during four months of monsoon (June- September) causing almost all the rivers carry heavy discharge during this period. The flood hazard is compounded by the problems of sediment deposition, drainage congestion and synchronization of river floods with sea tides in the coastal plains. The area vulnerable to floods is 40 million hectares and the average area affected by floods annually is about 8 million hectares. The average annual total damage to crops, houses, public utilities during the period 1953- 1995 was about Rs.9720 million4 (See Annexure 1.3).

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Map 1.3: Flood Hazard Map, India

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BoxMajor Natural Disasters in India and Their Impacts

Major Natural Disaster By No of People AffectedDisaster Date Total AffectedFlood 3/7/2007 18,700,000Flood 24/07/2005 20,000,055Flood 20/06/2004 33,000,000Drought 7/1/2002 300,000,000Flood 21/06/2002 42,000,000Flood 18/09/2000 24,600,000Flood 2/8/2000 22,000,000Drought 4/1/2000 50,000,000Storm 28/10/1999 12,628,312Flood 9/1/1999 22,120,000Flood 8/1/1998 29,227,200Flood 9/1/1997 29,259,000Flood 1/9/1995 32,704,000Flood 8/7/1993 128,000,000Drought 5/1/1987 300,000,000Flood 8/1/1982 33,500,000Drought 6/1/1982 100,000,000Flood 8/1/1980 30,000,023Flood 7/1/1975 34,000,000Drought 1972 200,000,000Drought 1965 100,000,000

Source: "EM-DAT: The OFDA/CRED International Disaster Databas2 (from www.em-dat.net - Université Catholique de Louvain - Brussels – Belgium.

Major Natural Disaster By No of People KilledDisaster Date KilledFlood 3/7/2007 1,103Earthquake (seismic activity) 8/10/2005 1,309Flood 24/07/2005 1,200Earthquake (seismic activity) 26/12/2004 16,389Flood 20/06/2004 900Extreme temperature 14/05/2003 1,210Extreme temperature 10/5/2002 1,030Extreme temperature 12/1/2002 900Earthquake (seismic activity) 26/01/2001 20,005Storm 28/10/1999 9,843Flood 8/1/1998 1,811Storm 9/6/1998 2,871Extreme temperature 26/05/1998 2,541Earthquake (seismic activity) 29/09/1993 9,748Earthquake (seismic activity) 20/10/1991 1,500Flood 5/1/1994 2,001Flood 28/07/1989 1,591Epidemic 5/1/1984 3,290Epidemic 11/1/1988 3,000

Source: Source: EM-DAT: The OFDA/CRED International Disaster Database, www.em-dat.net - Université Catholique de Louvain - Brussels - Belgium"

Droughts

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Drought is a temporary reduction in water or moisture availability significantly below the normal or expected amount for a specific period. This condition occurs either due to inadequacy of rainfall, or lack or irrigation facilities, under-exploitation or deficient availability for meeting the normal crop requirements in the context of the agro-climatic conditions prevailing in any particular area. This has been scientifically computed as Moisture index (M I). There is a drought in Jaisalmer (Average rainfall 200 mm) if rainfall is not sufficient to grow grass an paltry coarse-grains, whereas in Bolangir or Koraput (Orissa-rainfall above 1000 mm) there is a drought if there is not enough rainfall for bringing the paddy crop to maturity5.

68 per cent or roughly 2/3 of the country's arable area is at one time or the other susceptible to drought. Most of the major states have both drought as well as high rainfall areas. The drought of 1987, caused by the failure of the southwest monsoon over large parts of India, was one of worst in the century. Droughts can be mitigated through Employment Generation, b) Provision of drinking water, c) Fodder availability, d) Supply of essential commodities and e) Drought Proofing6.

Forest FiresThe most common hazard in forests is forests fire. Forests fires are as old as the forests themselves. They pose a threat not only to the forest wealth but also to the entire regime to fauna and flora seriously disturbing the bio-diversity and the ecology and environment of a region. During summer, when there is no rain for months, the forests become littered with dry senescent leaves and twinges, which could burst into flames ignited by the slightest spark. The Himalayan forests, particularly, Garhwal Himalayas have been burning regularly during the last few summers, with colossal loss of vegetation cover of that region7.

Of the 35 states and union territories, as many as 27 are disaster prone. And if the perceived threats due to other disasters such as chemical and terrorist attacks are added, every square inch of India is vulnerable, calling for immediate attention and sustained effort.

Landslides 8 Landslides are simply defined as the mass movement of rock, debris or earth down a slope and have come to include a broad range of motions whereby falling, sliding and flowing under the influence of gravity dislodges earth material. They often take place in conjunction with earthquakes, floods and volcanoes. At times, prolonged rainfall causing heavy block the flow or river for quite some time. The formation of river blocks can cause havoc to the settlements downstream on it's bursting.

In the hilly terrain of India including the Himalayas, landslides have been a major and widely spread natural disaster the often strike life and property and occupy a position of major concern. The worst landslide in the recent years was on August 11 & 17, 1998 at Malpa Uttarkhand (UP) where nearly 380 people were killed when massive landslides

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washed away the entire village. This included 60 pilgrims going to Lake Mansarovar in Tibet. Consequently various land reform measures have been initiated as mitigation measures.

The two regions most vulnerable to landslides are the Himalayas and the Western Ghats. The Himalayas mountain belt comprise of tectonically unstable younger geological formations subjected to severe seismic activity. The Western Ghats and Nilgiris are geologically stable but have uplifted plateau margins influenced by neo- tectonic activity. Compared to Western Ghats & Nilgiris region, the slides in the Himalayas region are huge and massive and in most cases the overburden along with the underlying lithology is displaced during sliding particularly due to the seismic factor.

Multi-Hazard Risk AreasThere are many regions in India which are multi-hazard risk prone. Annexure 1.4 gives the list of districts that are multi-hazard prone. 172 districts in the state are prone to Earthquake and floods together; 6 districts are prone to cyclonic winds and floods, 46 districts are prone to earthquake, cyclonic winds and flood and 17 districts are prone to earthquake and cyclonic winds. These hazard prone districts are located in 17 states and union territories of the country. Hence, a large part of the country is multi-hazard prone.

1.2 National Poverty Profile

Poverty is not simply a matter of inadequate income but also a matter of low literacy, short life expectation and lack of basic needs such as drinking water.9 According to the Planning Commission of India, 27.5 per cent of the population (301.72 million people)10

live in absolute poverty, defined by their inability to consume a basket of goods that includes minimum defined calorie consumption11. Poverty, defined as set of deprivations would put the figure of those deprived far above the 301 million people, a figure that is largely unacceptably. In 1993-94, 35.97 per cent population (320.37 million people) were living below the poverty line and hence, just 18.65 million people have come out of poverty in the decade of 1993-94 to 2004-05, when India has witnessed a high GDP growth. There is now a consensus in India that the GDP growth in India has not been accompanied by more rapid poverty reduction. Not just that, rapid economic growth rate has led to increase in inequality across the states in India and within the states in India.

Table 1.2: Various Dimensions of Poverty, IndiaRural Urban

HCR PG SPG Gini HCR PG SPG Gini1987-88 39.0 9.3 3.2 29.9 38.7 10.2 3.8 35.01993-94 37.2 8.5 2.8 28.6 32.6 8.0 2.9 34.42004-05 28.7 5.8 1.8 30.5 25.9 6.2 2.0 37.6HCR = Head Count Ratio; PG = Poverty Gap Index; SPG Squared Poverty Gap IndexSource: Himanshu (2007: 498).

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The overall inequality increase in India in the rural and urban areas can be seen from the increased value of Gini co-efficient of consumption expenditure after the onset of reforms. In 1993-94, the Gini co-efficient of rural consumption went up to 30.5 from 28.6 in 1993-94 (Table 1.1) and that of the urban consumption from 34.4 to 37.6 in the same year. Important fact to note is reduction in the values of Gini co-efficients in the 1987-88 to 1993-94 period, in both the rural and urban areas. While the inequality has increased, the absolute poverty incidence, depth of poverty (represented by Poverty Gap index) and severity of poverty (represented by Squared Poverty Gap index) have gone down in the rural and urban areas consistently from 1987-88. In fact, the decline in depth and severity of poverty is higher in the 1993-94 to 2004-05 period in the rural areas and in the 1987-88 to 1993-94 period in the urban areas.

The failure in poverty reduction inspite of rapid economic growth since 1993-94 could be attributed to the poor performance of agricultural growth; agricultural production barely kept pace with population growth during the period, the annual growth of per capita output being negative. Agricultural production per rural person, agricultural wages and rising food prices were found to be the major factors underlying the year to year variations in the percentage of rural poor. In this decade, agriculture sector crises is reflected in large number of incidences of farmers’ suicides across the states in India, in particular in those in the south and west that have benefited much more than those in the east and north.

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Figure 1.1: Incidence and Changes in Rural Poverty, States

It is worth mentioning that the spatial map and social base of poverty have significantly changed over time and poverty is increasingly concentrated in a few geographical locations and among specific socially disadvantaged groups. Among the social groups, poverty is chronic among the Scheduled Tribes (STs), with 47.2 per cent of them falling below the poverty line in the rural India, followed by the Scheduled Castes (SCs) with 36.8 per cent falling below the poverty line in rural India. In only three of all the states, Bihar, Uttar Pradesh and Karnataka, incidence of poverty is higher among the SCs than the STs. Haryana does not have ST population and hence incidence of poverty in ST group in Haryana is 0.

Figure 1.2: Rural HCR by Social Groups by States, 2004-0512

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The regional differences in poverty reduction are found to be substantial (Figure 1.1). The decline in state’s incidence of poverty has ranged between 3 to 26 percentage points in rural areas during 1993-94 to 2004-05. Jammu and Kashmir has registered the largest percentage decline in rural poverty followed by Assam. The slowest reduction in rural poverty decline has been in Orissa (2.9 percentage points) and then in Gujarat (3.1 percentage points). To note is that rural poverty reduction has slowed down in Orissa at a very high incidence of poverty. Figure 1.1 shows that the eastern states with Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh stand out as with high incidence of rural poverty, followed by the western states, then southern states and then the northern states. Orissa, Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh and West Bengal have higher incidence of rural poverty in 2004-05. Some among them such as Bihar has and West Bengal have registered high reduction in rural poverty in 1993-94 period and others slow.

The inter-state variations in the rural poverty reduction have been attributed to the variations in their agricultural productivity improvement. In addition, initial endowments of physical infrastructure and human resources did contribute to the inter-state variations in the performance. States such as Andhra Pradesh, Kerala and West Bengal, which had a higher rural poverty ratio in the pre-reforms phase have seen substantial reduction in poverty from 1973-74 to 2004-05. This is because Andhra Pradesh benefiting from green revolution, and Kerala and West Bengal which from the implementation of land reforms.

The decline in rural poverty has not removed hunger in India states. The Hunger Index prepared by the International Food Poverty Research Institute (IFPRI) in 2008 has a special reporting on Indian states. This report states that although the incidence of poverty has declined in India, hunger continues to mar the growth achievements. The hunger is measured through an index comprising of three components: (i) prevalence of calorie under-nourishment (calculated from the consumption data of 2004-05 National Sample Survey), (ii) proportion of underweight children below age 5 (from the NFHS-III data) and (iii) under five mortality rate (from NFHS-III survey). The key findings of this report are13:

India’s Global Hunger Index (GHI) 2008 score is 23.7, which ranks it 66 th out of 88 countries. This indicates continued poor performance at reducing hunger in India.

The India State Hunger Index (ISHI) 2008 was constructed in a similar fashion as the

GHI 2008 to enable comparisons of states within India, and to compare Indian states to GHI 2008 scores and ranks for other countries.

The ISHI 2008 score was estimated for 17 major states in India, covering more than 95 percent of the population of India.

ISHI 2008 scores for Indian states range from 13.6 for Punjab to 30.9 for Madhya Pradesh, indicating substantial variability among states in India. Punjab is ranked 34th when compared to the GHI 2008 country rankings, while Madhya Pradesh is ranked 82nd. All 17 states have ISHI scores that are well above the “low” and

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“moderate” hunger categories. Twelve of the 17 states fall into the “alarming” category, and one - Madhya Pradesh – into the “extremely alarming” category.

ISHI scores are closely aligned with poverty, but there is little association with state level economic growth. High levels of hunger are seen even in states that are performing well from an economic perspective.

Inclusive economic growth and targeted strategies to ensure food sufficiency, reduce child mortality and improve child nutrition are urgent priorities for all states in India.

1.2.1 Poverty, Growth and Human Development Since the Early 1990sIt is widely known that the Indian economy, as measured by its Gross Domestic Product (GDP), has grown rapidly since 1980, and that the growth has been sustained during the last decade and a half. The growth process has not been altogether uniform. Since the acceleration of ‘reforms’ in 1991, involving essentially widespread deregulation, privatization and opening up the Indian economy to relatively unrestricted imports of goods and services as well as inflow and outflow of capital as finance, there have been distinct episodes of rapid growth interspersed with periods of slower growth. Overall, the GDP growth rate has been impressive at around 6 per cent between 1991 and 2007. More recently, it has been in the neighbourhood of 8 per cent between 2004-05 and 2007-08. Currently, the growth process faces some serious risks in view of the global financial and economic crisis.

While the growth record is thus impressive, its composition and its implications in terms of inclusion/exclusion have been matters of concern. The growth has occurred primarily in the services sector, and to a lesser extent, in the secondary sector.14 But the agrarian economy has seen serious setbacks. The large numbers of farmers’ suicides has been a particularly spectacular and distressing manifestation, but the crisis is indeed many-sided, with falling levels of investment, worsening terms of trade for agriculture, decline in availability and rise in cost of institutional credit, sharp increases in input costs on account of subsidy cuts to meet fiscal deficit targets, flood of cheap agricultural imports from the end of the 1990s, and stagnation in area, yield and output of food grain between 1999-2000 and 2006-07.

The second area of serious concern is employment. The rate of growth of employment between 1993-94 and 1999-2000 fell significantly below that for the period 1987-88 to 1993-94, for both urban and rural areas and for both males and females.15 Although it recovered between 1999-2000 and 2004-05, the increase was mostly in the self-employed category, and entailed rather low annual earnings. Over the longer term as well, the rate of growth of employment between 1993-94 and 2004-05 was lower than that between 1983 and 1993-94. Rural real wage rates, which had shown a rise in the 1990s, have stagnated or declined since 1999-2000. The increase in employment in the economy has been almost entirely in the unorganized sector, and even when there has been an increase in employment in the organized sector, it has been in the casual/contract categories.

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Besides these macro economic parameters, there are other concerns as well. There has been clear evidence of an increase in inequality of income and asset distributions across social and economic categories over the reform period. There is also evidence of increasing inter-state inequality.

As against these negative features, in the more recent period there have been new policy initiatives such as the passing of the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA) and the Tribal Forest Rights Act ( TFRA), judicial activism in respect of school feeding programmes and the Integrated Child Services Scheme (ICDS), and the passing of the Right to Information (RTI) Act, which can be potentially powerful weapons for addressing deprivation and the issue of long term vulnerability of the poor against external shocks. Unfortunately, these initiatives have not been matched by adequate allocations, and there are issues of weaknesses in the implementation machinery, especially relating to governance and decentralization to elected local bodies.

1.3 Multiple Vulnerability o Disasters – Some Plausible Links in India

There exists a direct link between natural disasters and the situation of poverty. Hazards like floods, cyclones and droughts are noted for aggravating poverty in two ways: through destruction of food stocks and meagre assets of the poorer households; and, through making employment opportunities scarce.

The rural as well as urban poor loose their employment during and in the immediate period of the disaster. Nearly all the poor (those in the bottom half of the consumption bracket) are either self-employed or wage employed, both the categories of workers would loose income the day they do not work. This is true for the urban as well as rural areas. They do not own much savings or assets to pull through when they do not work. And hence, during the disasters if the relief does not reach in time, as it is likely to happen in less accessible and less developed areas, they tend to face situation of hunger.

Because they own fewer assets to cover the expenditure needed during the disaster and recovery phases they have to depend on borrowing principally from the money lenders, in situation where the micro-finance institutions do not exists (and these do not in large parts). Thus, once the relief efforts withdraw, they may have difficulty in getting back to normal life, including buying food. Self-employed may loose their employment implements and may therefore find it difficult to get back to normal work levels, resulting in loss of income for some time to come. In case of institutional failure, governmental or non-governmental, it is possible that the poverty increases or deepens.

Disasters such as cyclones, followed by floods, and floods destroy the crops and hence local food security which is very important in states such as Orissa that are still primarily agrarian states. Droughts also reduce local food security. In the contemporary context, the Public Distribution System (PDS) is expected to serve the purpose of ensuring food

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security in the times of disasters. The Integrated Child Development Scheme (ICDS) and MidDay Meal Scheme are supposed to take care of the nutritional programmes for the children and these could ensure food security in the times of disasters.

In context of India access to the PDS is for those with ration cards and food grains are available to those with Below Poverty Line (BPL) ration card. At the all-India level 81 per cent of rural households and 67 per cent of urban households held ration cards16. BPL cards were held by 26.5 per cent of rural households and 10.5 per cent of urban households. When it came to accessing PDS, just 24.4 per cent rural households and 13.1 per cent urban households consumed PDS rice and 11.0 per cent rural and 5.8 per cent urban household consumed wheat (or wheat flour) from the PDS. The figures are very low. In rural areas, 30 per cent households consumed their home grown rice and 40 per cent consumed their home grown wheat. The rest would have purchased food grains from the market, and if that is affected, people go without food. The dependence on the public system is very low and hence, in Indian context great vulnerabilities arise with regards to food security in times of disasters.

Poverty often leads to vulnerability to disasters, particularly to floods, riverbank erosion, coastal cyclones and tidal surge. The poorer households usually settle on less desirable high-risk peripheral land; and are unable to afford disaster proof housing. Consequently they are compelled to evacuate in case of a disaster, and have lower access to social and economic support needed for recovery.

In urban areas, the poor are invariably concentrated on the marginal lands, prone to flooding in monsoons and in times of floods. They are on the riverbanks and have to be evacuated every

The gender dimension of vulnerability suggests that risks and impacts of environmental crises and natural disasters are experienced by women and men differently and are mediated by their differential access to and control over resources and familial relationships. Natural disasters also result in reaffirmation and re-genesis of traditional gender patterns in communities as the need for care giving and daily household maintenance in a difficult disaster situation expands their workload dramatically. Where life-saving skills are concerned, women are at a disadvantage due to social confinement and are more vulnerable to violence, personal injury, drowning, and health hazards. Furthermore, break up of marriages and desertion of wives, children and the elderly often increase during and after disasters following migration of men in search of employment. Female headed households have less access to social, political and financial resources and are more likely to experience a more difficult recovery process than similarly poor male-headed households. Lastly, because of damage to local water sources, fuel and fodder sources (depending on the type of disaster), the burden of women to collect these basic necessities increase along with increased time spent on care-giving activities.

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Age differentials play a critical role in creating greater vulnerability to disease, discomfort and dependency during a disaster. Particularly the children and the elderly suffer more and mortality rates are found to be much higher among the very young and the very old. The malnourishment levels among children in India are quite high and hence the impacts of disaster would be high on the children.

In context of India, the socially marginal groups, such as the Scheduled Tribes (STs) and the Scheduled Castes (SCs) are more adversely affected than the other castes. To start with, these groups have higher incidence of poverty, as shown in this chapter. The STs in particular, tend to live in remote / less accessible regions (as they tend to live in the forest areas), and reaching out to them in times of disasters is very low.

Disaster also damages infrastructure, both economic and social. It destroys also communication networks. The disaster affected areas get cut-off physically as well as in communications sense. Hence, rescue and relief efforts slow down. This is more the case with rural areas than urban areas. Further, damage to economic infrastructure slows down economic activities and damage to schools and health centres also affect adversely education and health care. In case disasters are followed by epidemics, the casualties can go up if health care infrastructure is severely damaged. Schools tend to be used as shelter in times of cyclones and floods. Then, the education suffers.

Persistent droughts lead to population out-migrating as survival strategy. In that case the children also move with their parents. They tend to miss on their education. Migration from the drought-prone regions is temporary (seasonal) and the children do not get to attend school either in their home place or in the place where they have migrated. Education of children from drought prone regions poses a real challenge for the policy makers.

In urban areas, the poor are living in the slum housing, in semi-permanent or temporary type of structures. Of the 24.7 million housing shortage estimated in urban India, 97 per cent is for the poor17. Some disasters such as earthquake and cyclone makes them shelterless and then exposed to elements of nature. Shelterless, they are prone to epidemic outbreaks.

There are differential impacts of extensive disaster on the poor and non-poor. Extensive disaster such as epidemics or fire, adversely affect the poor more than non-poor. Epidemics, which are preventable through public health programmes, strike the poor the most, as these tend to outbreak from the areas inhabited by the poor. In cities, the areas inhabited by the poor tend to have poor public health infrastructure and hence the epidemic outbreaks are more from these areas than areas with good public infrastructure, that tend to be inhabited by the non-poor. Fire destroys the temporary shelters of the poor than the permanent structures, which are inhabited by the rich. Invariably, temporary housing structures are inhabited by the poor.

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Intensive disasters often affect every one, such as Tsunami and earthquake. In fact, earthquake is called a great leveller; those living in permanent structures tend to loose much more than those living in temporary structures. Because, the chances of survival are much more in temporary structures than in permanent structures, as the experience of Gujarat Earthquake of 2001 showed. Tsuname destroyed both, temporary as well as permanent structures. But, cyclone, which is an intensive disaster, may adversely affect the poor than the non-poor as surely the temporary structures of the former are blown away in cyclones.Lastly, in general, absence of any social security measures and institutions in place to cover the risks such as disasters, those deprived of development benefits, suffer the most in times of any disaster that increases the vulnerability of all affected.

All the above relationships are influenced by the community and regional deprivations.

1.4 Framework

Alejandro et at (2008)18 have proposed a two way relationship between disaster and poverty. They have proposed two key hypotheses to tackle the central lines of research:

Hypothesis 1Poverty is likely to correlate with (a) the exposure of households to natural hazards, (b) their susceptibility to suffer loss from hazard events.

Part (a) stems from location factors as both rural and urban households are typically being pushed due to land ownership and market factors to marginal hazard prone areas (i.e., steep land or squatter settlements). Part (b) refers to housing materials of poorer quality, infrastructure, and production activities which are typically unsafe or less resilient to hazard impacts.

Hypothesis 2Natural hazards are likely to (a) contribute to poverty by affecting human development indicators and assets directly, as well as indirectly through affecting their attributes of value and productivity; and (b) exacerbate the household’s inability to avoid or recover from poverty due to their aggregate nature, in combination with the absence or inadequate application of coping mechanisms.

Part (a) relates to the more visible impact of hazards on household members and assets themselves. Physical assets can be used for income-generating activities to entitle households to goods and services that facilitate achievement of different dimensions of wellbeing, such as consumption. Their depletion in turn, can lead to short-term welfare fluctuations and push people into sudden poverty. Human capital assets (i.e., nutrition and health), which can also improve people’s ability to take advantage of income-

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generating opportunities, are important in their own right. Any effect on the bodies of household members (death, sickness, injury), therefore, can also lead to poverty.

Part (b) alludes to the fact that natural hazards are often highly covariate rendering co-insurance mechanisms less effective, which combined with lower physical and human capital endowments characteristic of poor households making them badly situated to handle risk-related losses. It also suggests that existing policy responses and conditions at a more aggregate level (district and sub-district level) may condition the extent to which households can avoid falling into poverty. Inadequate safety nets, unsound growth conditions alongside restricted access to credit and insurance markets and uneven distribution patterns may lead to a less conducive environment for coping. This effect on poverty could also be appreciated where the district and sub-district are the units of analysis.

The proposed framework appraises the two way relationship between natural hazards and poverty. For India Report, we remain with the framework, except that add in three aspects peculiar to the situation of India.

(i) Added human development attainment as a capability dimension in these two way relationships (as suggested by Alexandro et al 2008) and also consider lags in human development as representing multi-dimensional deprivation.

(ii) Added social group dimension to the deprivation framework, poverty; lack of human development and political disempowerment restricted to certain communities, broadly classified as Scheduled Tribes (STs) and Scheduled Castes (SCs). The two way relationship gets strongly influenced by the social group dimension than just income and asset aspect. In other words, community level capabilities are as important as individual household capabilities in dealing with the situation of disasters.

(iii) Macro capabilities of a region are as important as individual household capabilities. The Alexandro et al (2008) paper focuses on household level capabilities whereas, in India, the unevenness of development has resulted in whole regions have low capabilities to deal with the situation of disaster. Thus, a household in a less developed region has lower capabilities to cope with disaster than the more developed region. For example, epidemics may result in deaths in one situation (where public health infrastructure is weak) but may not result in deaths in other situation (where public health infrastructure is available and efficiently functioning). This aspect has a very strong public policy angle.

1.5 MethodologyThe methodology for this report is quite different than what Alexandro et al suggest. This emanates from the fact that household level panel data are not available to test the two way hypotheses. Thus, development, poverty, other deprivations and capabilities have

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been observed at the district level, wherever possible by rural urban separately. This is the content of Chapter 2. The hazard risk and disaster impacts have been observed at the district level in Chapters 3 and 4. Chapter 5 is an attempt to correlate the socio-economic vulnerabilities and capabilities with the disaster impacts. Attempt is made to observe the impacts of disaster by intensive/ extensive disasters, climatological/ non-climatological disasters and by different explanatory variables such as levels of vulnerability represented by Head Count Ratios (HCRs), rural vs urban, Human Development attainments (represented by HDI) and incomes. These are correlated with each other through simple pearson’s coefficient of correlation and scatter plots.

A Note on DataThis methodology has been followed primarily from the data availability in India. The large scale household surveys are carried out by National Sample Surveys, canvassed over whole of India, quinquennially. Every five years, information on consumption, employment, education levels, housing conditions, land asset ownership, migration, etc. are carried out. But, these do not form panel data, as the consumption expenditures are shifting upwards, and household profiles are changing with the shift in consumption expenditures. The sample selected for these surveys is based on the concept of representativeness and not from the idea of generating panel data. Hence, even though these surveys offer possibilities of building information on household level consumption and asset situation, they do not offer possibilities of temporal monitoring of changes in levels of living, asset structures, vulnerabilities, etc. of the same set of households. But, these surveys give tremendous insight into one time point levels of living, asset structures, vulnerabilities etc. Hence these data for two time points have been used.

The disaster impact data are from disInventor data set. This also has some limitations; the events reported/ recorded and then the impacts reported/ recorded are related to the compensation packages available and the efficiency of the state government machinery in intervening in the relief and post-disaster recovery.

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Annexure 1.1Region-wise earthquake (M>5.0) occurrence in India (1897 - 1993)

Seismic Region No. of Earthquakes of Magnitude Return Period5.0-5.9* 6.0-6.9 7.0-7.9 8.0+

Kashmir &WesternHimalayas

25 7 2 1 2.5-3 yrs.

Central Himalayas 68 28 4 1 1 yrs.North East India 200 128 15 4 <4 months

1 From the presentation ‘Changing Paradigm in Dealing with Disasters – Indian Experience’, by P.G. Dhar-Chakrabarti, Executive Director of National Institute of Disaster Management on 21-02-2007 (source: http://siteresources.worldbank.org/INTDISMGMT/Resources/339456-1158594430052/2950719-1172608676692/chakrabarti.pdf accessed on October 29, 2008).

2 From the presentation ‘Changing Paradigm in Dealing with Disasters – Indian Experience’, by P.G. Dhar-Chakrabarti, Executive Director of National Institute of Disaster Management on 21-02-2007 (source: http://siteresources.worldbank.org/INTDISMGMT/Resources/339456-1158594430052/2950719-1172608676692/chakrabarti.pdf accessed on October 29, 2008).

3 From http://www.nidm.net/Earthquakes.asp (accessed October 29, 2008).4 From http://www.nidm.net/flood.asp (accessed on October 29, 2008).6 From http://www.nidm.net/Drought1.asp (accessed on October 29, 2008).7 From http://www.nidm.net/Forest_Fires.asp (accessed on October 29, 2008).8 This section from http://www.nidm.net/Landslides.asp (accessed on October 29, 2008).9 Report of the XI Plan Working Group on Poverty Elimination Programmes (December 2006)10 Press Information Bureau (2007): Poverty Estimates for 2004-05, Government of India, March.11 2100 kcal per day per person for the urban areas and 2400 kcal per day per person for the rural

areas.12 Estimates by the Planning Commission, India, from the Planning Commission website.13 Menon, Purnima, Anil Deolalikar and Anjor Bhaskar (2008): The India State Hunger Index:

Comparisons Of Hunger Across States, An Advance Copy for Discussion, IFPRI, India, October 14, 2008 (from the website accessed on October 16, 2008).

14 Chandrasekhar, C.P. and Jayati Ghosh ( 2005): The Market that Failed, LeftWord, New Delhi.15 Chandrasekhar, C.P. and Jayati Ghosh ( 2005): The Market that Failed, LeftWord, New Delhi.16 National Sample Survey Organisation (2007): Public Distribution System and Other Sources of

Household Consumption, 2004-05, Volume –I, NSS 61st Round (July 2004-June 2005), Report No. 510(61/1.0/3), Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation, Government of India.

17 From National Urban Housing and Habitat Policy (NUHHP), 2007 of the Ministry of Housing & Urban Poverty Alleviation, Government of India, New Delhi. Source: http://mhupa.gov.in/policies/duepa/HousingPolicy2007.pdf

18 de la Fuente, Alejandro, Luis Felipe López-Calva and Aromar Revi (2008): Assessing the Relationship between Natural Hazards and Poverty: A Conceptual and Methodological Proposal, Document Prepared for ISDR-UNDP Disaster Risk-Poverty Regional Workshops in Bangkok, Thailand (22-24 April 2008) and Bogotá, Colombia (10-11 June, 2008).

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Indo-GangeticBasin andRajasthan

14 6 - - 5 yrs

Cambay and Rann of Kutch

4 4 1 1 20 yrs.

Peninsualr India 31 10 - - 2.5-3 yrs.Andaman & Nicobar

80 68 1 1 <8 months

* These are approximate numbersSource: http://www.nidm.net/Earthquakes2_i.asp

Annexure 1.2Some Important Cyclones in India

Location Date DamagesTamil Nadu Dec, 1972 80 people and 150 cattle killed and communication disrupted.Bengal Sept, 1976 10 people and 40,000 cattle lost life. Damage to property

including communicationAndhra Coast Nov, 1977 8547 people and 40,000 cattle lost life. Communication

disrupted heavy loss to property.Tamil Nadu May, 1979 700 people and 300,000 cattle lost life. Communication

disruptedOrissa Sept, 1985 84 people and 2600 cattle lost life. Land of 4.0 hac damaged.Andhra Coast Nov, 1987 50 people and 25,800 cattle lost life, 8400 houses, roads and

other communication disrupted.Orissa June, 1989 61 people and 27,000 cattle lost life, 145,000 houses,

communication disrupted.Andhra coast May, 1990 928 human lives lost, 14000 houses damaged.Tamil Nadu Nov, 1991 185 people and 540 cattle. Property including roads worth

300 Crores damaged.Bengal April, 1993 Over 100 casualties, communication system including road

disrupted and damaged.Bengal Nov, 1994 More than a thousand houses damaged in 26 villages

damage to lake and fisheries, disrupted all communication.Andhra Coast Oct, 1996 1057 casualties, 647,000 houses damaged road network

completely damaged.Gujarat June, 1998 1261 casualties, 2.57 Lakh houses damaged.Orissa Oct, 1999 10,086 casualties, 21.6 Lakh houses damagedSource : http://www.nidm.net/Cyclones1.asp (accessed on October 29, 2008).

Annexure 1.3Average annual loss due to Floods19

S.No. Items Loss1. Area affected 7.351 million hectare2. Population affected 40.967 million3. Human lives lost 1,793 number4. Cattle lost 85,599 number5. Houses damaged 1,452,904 number

19 From http://www.nidm.net/flood6.asp (accessed on October 29, 2008).21

6. Houses damaged 3706.07million7. Crop area damaged 3.725 million hectare8. Crop damaged 10951.32 million9. Public Utilities damaged 11864.56 million10. Total losses 27062.43 millionSource: Central Water Commission, Ministry of Water Resources, Government of India.

Annexure 1.4Summary of Census 2001 Districts Having Substantial Multi-hazard Risk Areas

StateName of Districts having substantial multi-hazard prone area

E.Q. and Flood Cyclonic wind and Flood

E.Q., Cyclonic wind and Flood

E.Q. and Cyclonic wind

1. Andhra Pradesh Adilabad, Karim-Nagar, Khammam

Krishna, Nellore, Srikakulam, Vishakhapatnam, Vizianagram

East-Godavari, Guntur, Prakasam, West-Godavari

-

2. Assam All 19 districts listed in Table - 2 could have M.S.K. IX or more with flooding

Cachar, Hailakandi, Karimganj

(No storm surge)

-

3. Bihar All 32 Districts listed in Table - 2

- - -

4. Jharkhand Sahibganj, Godda - - -5. Goa - - - North-Goa

South-Goa6. Gujarat Banaskantha,

Patan, Dangs, Gandhinagar, Mahesana, Panchmahals,

- Ahmedabad1, Kheda, Bharuch1, Narmada1, Surat1, Navsari1, Valsad1, Anand1,Vadodara

(1 Storm surge possible)

Amreli1, Rajkot, Bhavnagar1, Jamnagar1, Porbandar1,

Junagad1, Kachch1

(1 Storm surge possible)

7. Haryana All 18 Districts listed in Table - 2

- - -

8. Kerala - Alappuzha1, Idukki1, Ernakulam1, Kannur1, Kasaragod1, Kollam1, Kottayam1, Thrissur1

Kozhikode1, Malappuram1, Palakkad1, Pathanamthitta1, Thiruvananthapuram1

(1 Storm surge possible)

Wayanad1

(1 Storm surge possible)

9. Maharashtra - - - Mumbai, Thane, Rayagad, Ratnagiri, Sindhudurg

10. Orissa - Ganjam Baleshwar1, Puri1,

Bhadrak1, Jajapur, Kendrapara1, Jagatsinhapur1, Navagarh, Khordha. Cuttack,

Dhenkanal

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11. Punjab All 17 Districts listed in Table - 2

- - -

12. Uttar Pradesh All 61 Districts listed in Table - 2

- - -

13. Uttarnchal Hardwar, Nainital, Udham-Singh-Nagar

14. West Bengal Bankura, Birbhum Bardhaman, Darjeeling, Jalpaiguri, Kooch- Bihar, Malda, Murshidabad, West-Dinajpur

- Calcutta, Hugli, Howra, Mednipur, Nadia, North-24-Parganas, South-24-Parganas,

15. Delhi North-East, South - - -16. Pondicherry - - Yanam -17. Daman and Diu - - - DiuIndia 172 Districts 6 Districts 46 Districts 17 Districts

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Notes

5 From http://www.nidm.net/Drought.asp (accessed on October 29, 2008).

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