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Institute for Crisis, Disaster, and Risk Management Crisis and Emergency Management Newsletter Website |
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October/November
2007
Volume 13 - Number
1/2 |
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Trends in Disaster Costs By Thomas Crane Goal: to find the trends of the costs of disasters within the past three decades. In 2003, the Independent Evaluations Group of The World Bank reported that disaster costs around the world are greatly increasing. From 1990-1999, the report states that cost of major disasters was over $650 billion. On the contrary, 1980-1989 costs peaked just over $200 billion, preceded by a lesser $125+ billion in costs during the 1970’s. Additionally, the 2000’s is on pace to keep high disaster costs. Hurricane Katrina, the Asian Tsunami and the Pakistan/India earthquake are just a few disasters that will contribute to the great costs. The Cost of Disaster Damage in Billions 700 *650 600 500 400 300 *210 200 *110 100 *80 0 1950-1959 1960-1969 1970-1979 1980-1989 1990-1999 *Numbers are approximations based on IEG’s chart Source: www.worldbank.org/ieg/naturaldisasters/docs/natural_disasters_fact_sheet.pdf *World Disasters Report 2006 *Not used as a source but can be purchased and includes data regarding the costs of disasters. |