Seminar Programme: UK-South Asia Young Scientists and Practitioners Seminar on Climate Change and Disaster Impact Reduction

PROCEEDINGS

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Sessions Day2

Special Session

Professor David Petley, Durham University (Presentation Slides (PDF))
Professor David Petley explained how climate change would have a minimal effect on the incidence of geophysical hazards but vulnerability to such hazards is likely to increase. He presented data on the fatalities arising from landslides and the significance of the Asian Monsoon in driving landslide frequency. He distinguished between total rainfall and the seasonality of rainfall as triggers for landslides. Increase of fatal landslides was attributed to factors such as population growth, deforestation, conflict, social change, and road building.

Sean McKee, Fire and Rescue Services, Tyne and Wear (Presentation Slides (PDF))
Sean explained that September 11th had been the trigger for creation of a new model for the emergency services, with 6 phases. He stated that emphasis has been placed on operational logistics, inter-operability and a co-operative approach for efficacy. Case studies were shown of Boscastle and Carlisle with good video footage. He ended by emphasising and stressing the importance of collaboration between practitioners and academia towards more effective disaster management.

Rob Bell, a Contingency Planning Officer from Hounslow Council (Presentation Slides (PDF))
Rob explained that changing climate is a platform for developing community resilience in the UK. He noted that there is a legal obligation in the UK for the emergency services to work collaboratively with local authorities. He talked of the national response to emergencies. He explained the importance of vulnerability and the building of indicators to generate a more realistic picture of vulnerability. He identified the importance of mapping both risk and vulnerability and working on a localized scale to relate to people where the most vulnerable areas are.

Alonso Brenes Torres from LARED, Costa Rica (Presentation Slides (PDF))
Alonso began his presentation with a film from LARED. He explained the ENSO project. Conceptual changes and interpretations of risk were discussed and the links existing with climate change. New phases of ENSO are complex and there is a need for further research and international cooperation. The value of bridging different worlds of ethics, natural sciences, philosophy and social sciences were highlighted.

Discussion Summary on the Special Session
Many of the questions addressed the landslide risk in Nepal. The contribution of hydropower schemes were considered as well as the effect of land use change. It was noted by the speaker that while both hydropower schemes and deforestation have an undoubted effect on the incidence of landslides, deforestation in Nepal is no longer a key concern due to effective community forestry programmes. Roads are magnets for people, increasing risk, and rural out-migration may lead to terrace failure and trigger landslides. A distinction was made between triggers (rainfall, earthquakes and people) and wider causes (land use etc). Rising sea temperatures, it was also explained, led to higher energy in the system, increased rainfall (above average) which is more likely to trigger landslides.

Short questions and answers related to the use of satellite imagery for emergency planning, the transferability of risk preparedness from the UK to Kathmandu, and the applications of hazard mapping in Hounslow. A couple of questions were asked about risk communication in the UK. It was explained that few people actively seek out the information available or subscribe to systems in place (e.g. texts being sent to mobiles for flood warnings) and that technology can become quite ineffective during flood events as electricity is typically wiped out.

Climate Change and Resilience

Dinanath Bhandari, Practical Action, Nepal (Presentation Slides (PDF))
Dinanath presented findings from the field to highlight local experiences of climate change and their impacts. Ranges of methodologies were explored to examine local knowledge; existing adaptation practices and links to socio-economic change. He emphasised integrative adaptation strategies for poverty reduction, social inclusion and development.

Andrea Souza Santos, ERM, Brazil (Presentation Slides (PDF))
Andrea examined social and environmental vulnerabilities in the face of climate change in the semi-arid area of Bahai, Brazil. She indicated that by building a series of indices of socio-economic vulnerability, it was possible to predict future impacts. She noted that climate change could exacerbate agricultural difficulty and change the dynamics of socio-economic factors.

Manoj Badu, Kathmandu University (Presentation Slides (PDF))
Manoj presented the results from analysis of secondary data to examine potential health effects of climate change in Nepal. He reported data highlighting changes in the incidence of infectious diseases and agriculture in Nepal and concluded by suggesting possible interventions in health and agriculture.

Tahmina Rahman, BRAC, Bangladesh University (Presentation Slides (PDF))
Tahmina’s presentation centred on a fishing community in the Sundarbans located in Bangladesh. Following a description of the Sundarbans and the potential impacts of sea level rise in Bangladesh, she noted key characteristics of the fishing community and their livelihood strategies. She explained mechanisms they had adopted to cope with disasters and reflected upon the potential impacts of climate change on the fishing community. She concluded by highlighting strategies for risk reduction.

Discussion Summary on Climate Change and Resilience
Questions centred around the relationship between climate change and health following Manoj Badu’s presentation. It was explained that while the available data is reasonably reliable, it would require much further research to confidently assert the relationship between agricultural change, changes in health and climate change. Other questions were about evidence for drought in Nepal to Dinanath.

Climate Change and Geophysical Hazards

Katie Oven, Durham University (Presentation Slides (PDF))
Katie Oven explored the relationship between landslides, vulnerability and livelihoods, particularly along roads. She set out to explain who is vulnerable, why they are vulnerable, and what are the perceptions of risk and responses to risk. She presented case studies from the main highway between Kathmandu and China of different types of household situations – from those unaware of the risks; those who were aware but whose options to engage in other livelihood options were limited and those for whom benefits exceeded risk.

Dr Rijan Bhakta, Kathmandu University (Presentation Slides (PDF))
Dr Rijan Bhakta gave an informative presentation to examine the dynamics of glacial lakes in Nepal. GLOF will increase due to global warming and present a real threat in Nepal. He explained measure that had been attempted to reduce the threat, such as siphoning, early warning and open channels. The degree of threat may be affected by the extent of end moraine; and monitoring will help to inform the extent to which remedial measures may need to be taken.

Poorna S Yahampath, Sri Lanka (Presentation Slides (PDF))
Poorna S Yahampath examined landslide risk in Ratnapura in Sri Lanka. He related land use patterns to landslide risk. He presented a landslide hazard map and was able to relate landslide risk to land use patterns, suggesting that coconut, gardens and other land use types had a positive impact on landslides whereas forest, marsh and other vegetation had a negative effect.

Om Prasad Gautam (Presentation Slides (PDF))
Om Prasad Gautam talked about disaster risk reduction education in a secondary school in Dhaka in Bangladesh. He explained a little about how ProVention provides grants for young professionals. His research targeted 8 schools for awareness raising as several hundred thousand children are at risk from earthquake, floods and cyclones while at school in Bangladesh, yet simple measures may reduce risk by 50%. There is no living memory of earthquake in Bangladesh thus it was considered important to develop disaster preparedness for earthquakes. The change in knowledge level was assessed before and after the training.

Discussion following Climate Change and Geophysical Hazards
There were a few short questions. Katie was asked to elaborate upon her methodology. She acknowledged the importance of her research assistants in helping her conduct her research and explained that she has conducted interviews with more strategic actors, as well as feeding back some of her findings to interested parties.

An explanation was sought for the relatively higher incidence of landslides on tea plantations as it is generally accepted that there is rarely a high incidence of landslides on tea plantations as water is carefully managed. It was suggested that water is not managed well by smallholder tea producers. Some discussion was also held on the relationship between temperature change in the Kathmandu valley and glacial melt.