Mainstreaming disaster risk reduction into community development in the Windward Islands (original) (raw)

The Windward Islands are vulnerable to a number of natural hazards. This thesis examines the possibilities for Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR) in the Windward Islands. The Windward Islands offer a special case of “Island Vulnerability”. Island vulnerability is essentially defined as an increased probability in disaster events against what would be expected if vulnerability were to be measured against international levels of poverty, defined as Gross National Product per capita. There are three reasons for this namely the topography of islands, the site characteristics and the socio-economic setting. The topography is one where islands, largely of volcanic or coral origins, face multi-hazard experience particularly from flooding and storm surge. The site issue is that islands usually have a high ratio of coastline to land mass implying a relatively higher exposure to extreme events. The socio-economic conditions are peculiar to island including isolation, mono-agriculture and mono-indu...