Understanding global security - Peter Hough

NATURAL THREATS TO SECURITY
Better information
There is a case to be made that one key factor behind the rise in natural disasters is
simply that more are being reported in the world’s media. The ever extending lenses
of the global media and concerted efforts of a developing global epistemic community
continue to bring more events than ever before into focus.
Population growth
Since ‘if people are not involved there is no disaster’ (Loretti 2000), the more people
there are in the world the greater the likelihood of a natural hazard having human
security consequences and becoming a natural disaster. As significant population
growth in the world is now largely confined to the global South, where disaster
mitigation policy tends to be as underdeveloped as the economy, ever greater
numbers of people are being exposed to natural hazards.
Urbanization
The burgeoning population of Less Developed Countries (LDCs) in the main
manifests itself in the growth of major cities. Around half of the new megacities which
have emerged in LDCs are located in areas prone to seismic or storm activity. A fair
proportion of the 20,000 deaths in Nicaragua and Honduras caused by Hurricane
Mitch in 1998 were attributed to the rapid urbanization of those countries in recent
decades, which left far greater numbers of vulnerable people exposed to the wind’s
effects than in previous, similar disasters (Martine and Guzman 2002). Similarly,
the towns flattened by the Castita Volcano landslide prompted by Hurricane Mitch,
El Porvenir and Rolando Rodriguez, were recently constructed urban settlements.
Land degradation
In many cases natural disasters are triggered or exacerbated by a lack of natural
defences. Hence, changes in land use can have disastrous side-effects. For example,
the loss of traditional vegetation on river banks can increase the likelihood of flooding,
and on hillsides can make landslips more likely (UNEP 2002a: Chapter 3, p. 10).
Refugees
Increased flows of refugees and internally displaced people over recent years have
contributed to the increase in number and deadliness of natural disasters. Desperate
and, frequently, unwelcomed people are likely to settle in insecure places. The exodus
of around two million Afghanis to neighbouring Pakistan over the last two decades
has presented many of these people with a choice of relocating either in urban slums
or rural margins, such as mountain sides (Matthew and Zalidi 2002: 74–75). Either
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