World Disasters Report 2010 - International Federation of Red Cross ...

CHAPTER 1
22
Housing and urban disasters
The official statistics on disaster impacts suggest that the damage to, or destruction
of, housing (and other assets) is far more serious in high-income nations. But this is
misleading in that damage to or destruction of housing is usually far more serious
in low- and middle-income nations in terms of the number of households affected
and how much they are affected. This does not translate into a large monetary loss
because most of the homes destroyed or damaged were not worth much in monetary
terms or their monetary value is simply ignored because they are informal dwellings.
This is so even though the house is not only the most valuable asset for those
affected but also their home, and they receive little or no compensation when it is
damaged or destroyed. Of course, they also have no insurance so they do not figure
in any calculation of insurance payments. This is how disasters create or greatly
exacerbate poverty.
Each year, millions of households have their homes damaged or destroyed by disasters.
For instance, in 2007 there were extensive floods throughout South and South-East
Asia and in many nations in West and East Africa, while Hurricane Felix triggered
floods in Nicaragua. This pattern was repeated in 2008, from the hurricane season in
the Caribbean, to cyclones in Myanmar and Bangladesh and the devastating Sichuan
earthquake in China. In 2009, millions were affected by the earthquake in Sumatra,
Indonesia, and the floods in India and the Philippines.
Greater consideration is needed of the role that housing plays in urban areas for lowincome
groups such as the hundreds of thousands of slum dwellers rendered homeless
by the January 2010 earthquake in Haiti. The value and importance of housing to
such groups far exceeds its monetary value. What seems to outsiders to be no more
than a shack built mostly of temporary materials is actually the home with all its key
attributes for family and social life, privacy and safety, and is the primary defence for
those living there against most environmental health risks. It may also be the place
of work for some household members and is often the household’s most treasured
asset. As family members build or improve their home, they increase the value of
their asset and its capacity to protect them from hazards. It is also the means by which
they get access to income and services – and in urban areas, its location in relation to
income-earning opportunities and services is often more important for low-income
households than its size, quality or legality. This explains why such a high proportion
of informal settlements are on flood plains or steep slopes at risk of landslides, because
these are the only land sites within a city close to centres of employment that lowincome
groups can occupy.
Urban areas present two very specific challenges for housing. The first is that in low-
and middle-income nations, land prices for housing are usually much higher than
in rural areas. There are also often far more official rules and regulations governing
the acquisition and use of land for housing, which usually restricts land available and