Jerry Galea/ International Federation, Papua New Guinea 1999

Chapter 1 - summary
Relief, recovery and root causes

Recent massive floods, windstorms and earthquakes from Latin America to south Asia have set back development in hardest-hit areas by a decade – leaving thousands of communities more exposed than ever to disasters now recurring every few years. Many of the world's regions at risk from disasters simply fail to recover before another catastrophe strikes. Shattered families, homes, schools, roads, livelihoods take years to repair, let alone to rebuild and recover in a way more resilient to the next disaster.

Each year from 1991 to 2000, an average of 211 million people were killed or affected by natural disasters – seven times greater than the figure for those killed or affected by conflict. Globally during the last decade, natural disasters alone killed an average of nearly 1,300 people every week. Nations of low or medium human development provided 98 per cent of the victims.

Since the 1950s, costs associated with natural disasters have rocketed 14-fold. Meanwhile the world's richest nations donated just 0.39 per cent of their 1999 gross national products (GNPs) in annual overseas aid – half the amount the United Nations (UN) considers necessary. Of this figure, a fraction is invested in preventing disasters. Yet research suggests that US$ 40 billion spent in disaster mitigation would have reduced global economic losses in the 1990s by US$ 280 billion.

'Natural' can be a misleading description for disasters such as the droughts, floods and cyclones which afflict much of the developing world. As a proverb from the Horn of Africa says, "God makes drought. Man makes famine". Recognizing disasters as often un/natural, identifying human-made root causes, and advocating structural and political changes to combat them, is long overdue.

As un/natural disasters become ever-more frequent, aid dollars and development gains are being washed away. Catastrophe is no longer a brief dip on the curve of development but a danger to the process itself. The poorest of the poor are becoming more vulnerable, trapped in vicious cycles of structural poverty and marginalization beyond their power to change. Some places prone to continual un/natural disasters are becoming lawless and a threat to security.

Four things must happen simultaneously, if the cycle of disasters is to be broken and recovery is to take root:

• Programme emergency relief as the beginning – not the end – of increased commitment: Relief delivery can support or undermine disaster recovery. Too much relief delivered too fast overwhelms disaster survivors. Following 1999's super-cyclone which devastated India's coastal state of Orissa, aid was often indiscriminately dumped in areas enjoying the greatest media coverage. Aid workers spoke of 'relief supermarkets' creating expectations which made subsequent efforts to encourage community-based disaster preparedness very difficult.

Well-targeted relief, however, can provide a secure platform from which the disaster-affected can begin the slow process of recovery. Red Cross 'developmental relief' in Orissa, for example, included distributing saline-resistant seeds (plus the tools, fertilizers and agricultural training needed to make them grow) and promoting disaster-resistant housing for the most vulnerable. Communities themselves selected who should receive a 'model' house and villagers were taught how to construct them by skilled local masons.

• Inject the 'risk dimension' into development in all disaster-prone regions: Risk and disaster management must become part of the development process. The opportunities to mitigate future disasters will never be grasped unless governments analyse risks and develop disaster management plans. International agencies need to forge true partnerships with local non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and build their capacities to respond swiftly and effectively to their own disasters.

Following January 2001's devastating earthquake in El Salvador, international search-and-rescue teams poured in, but arrived too late to save many lives. The lesson which never gets learnt, according to one expert, is that "community preparedness is the only practical solution for poor countries located in high risk areas. The locals are the ones who can bring any effective help in the first few hours and it is their capacity that has to be strengthened. This is less heroic than flying in after the event waving fistfulls of dollars, but it is cheaper and demonstrably effective."

• Reform funding strategies to help bridge the relief-recovery gap: To provide the necessary resources, donors need to reform their funding structures to integrate relief and development, and to prioritize investment in risk reduction. To meet the challenge of recurring disasters, humanitarian organizations need long-term 'golden money' to maximize the benefits of long-term planning.

Strategic rather than humanitarian concerns often dictate where aid goes. Not only does support for appeals reflect political considerations, stated a recent UN report, but appeals are slanted to indulge those interests. A critical observer could conclude that aid agencies are putting financial interests ahead of humanitarian principles.

Rather than courting donors and governments, humanitarian organizations must advise and inform them, lead them to where the need is greatest, argue the case for assistance, and mobilize public opinion simultaneously. If donor or host government interest is misguided, agencies must be honest and courageous enough to say so.

• Seize the advocacy opportunity relief provides to tackle disasters' root causes: Aid cannot be blamed for failing to solve the root causes of disaster, such as climate change, inequitable world trade, poverty, indebtedness, or political indifference. But neither must aid be used as an alibi for inaction. Sustainable recovery is a task way beyond the capacities of humanitarian organizations alone. But disasters present the chance to seize the media spotlight and shine it towards root causes. As one expert argues, "Come a humanitarian crisis, the path of least resistance is always to launch an appeal, when often we could make a more long-term contribution if we used relief as an entry-point for advocacy."

Following Bangladesh's great 1970 cyclone, which killed half a million people, the International Federation persuaded the government and donors to invest in disaster preparedness. A 1991 cyclone took another 140,000 lives but half a million people, who might have died, survived because the Bangladesh Red Crescent's early warning system had alerted them.

Humanitarian agencies have a moral duty to engage with donors, host governments and the public in an honest dialogue about the limits of humanitarian action and the responsibilities of politicians and economists in tackling root causes and root solutions.

In conclusion, the challenges posed by complex emergencies such as cyclones and river erosion around the Bay of Bengal or drought in the Horn of Africa demand concurrent action, because disasters and needs endure on parallel levels. The homeless and threatened require relief while others are in the recovery phase or in need of rehabilitation. Where risk alone remains, development has to be paramount, prioritizing risk awareness, local disaster preparedness and low-cost mitigation. Advocacy towards governments, donors, agencies and communities must be unrelenting if action is to be maintained, root causes addressed, and the proper legal, political and economic tools employed.

John Sparrow, an independent writer who has worked as the International Federation's regional information delegate in Africa and Europe, wrote this chapter.