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>> 50 years of development gains >> Promoting democratic governance >> Driving economic growth >> Improving people's health >> Mitigating and managing conflict >> Providing humanitarian assistance >> The full measure of U.S. development assistance-official and private >> Notes >> Background papers >> References
More than three million people lost their lives in the disasters of the 1990s. Conflict-related emergencies were by far the most deadly, with civilians nine times more likely to be killed than the
combatants.36 Natural disasters are statistically less lethal (one-third the number killed in conflict-related emergencies), but they affected seven times as many people over the decade
as did conflict.
Reflecting this growing disaster problem and increased awareness, the international community
has responded. Between 1990 and 2000 (using 1999 prices and exchange rates), official development
assistance (ODA) for humanitarian aid programs grew from just over $2 billion to nearly $6 billion. In most years, the United States was the largest donor of humanitarian assistance by a factor of three to four.
There is no reason to believe that the 1990s disaster pattern was exceptional, with natural disasters
being more numerous and affecting more people but conflict-related disasters being more deadly.
Natural disasters will likely become even more devastating as populations at risk increase, and the
post-cold war world shows little sign of becoming less violent, although the conflicts now are often
internal or intrastate. The trends guarantee that humanitarian assistance will remain enormously
important for the international community and for the United States. They also guarantee that the
controversies will continue.
Natural Disasters
While conflict-related disasters have dominated the funding and focus of much international assistance over the last decade, natural disasters still take a tremendous toll worldwide. They are neither simple nor purely nature-induced, and their devastation in global economic terms and in terms of populations affected far outstrips the damage caused by conflict.
Natural disasters killed or affected an average of 211 million people per year during the 1990s
seven times more than the average of 31 million people killed or affected by conflict. The
number of deaths due to natural disasters during the decade estimated at 665,000 is only onethird
of the number estimated killed in conflict. For natural disasters, the lower numbers killed reflect the benefits of early warning and disaster preparedness measures as well as advances in such basic services as clean water and sanitation. The vast majority of those killed in natural disasters
occur in countries with low incomes and low levels of human development, reflecting the correlation
between poverty and vulnerability.
The rise in number of natural disasters has been meteoric. There were three times as many natural
disasters in the 1990s as in the 1960s. While geophysical disasters have remained somewhat steady
in number, hydrometeorological disasters have increased dramatically. The period 1991-95 saw
three El Niņo-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) phenomena, associated with the devastating southern
Africa droughts of 1991-92, 1993-94, and 1994-95. In 1997-98, the phenomena again affected
temperatures and rainfall patterns around the world. South and Central America had devastating
floods and landslides in some areas, drought in others. Southeast Asia had droughts and fires, and
East Africa heavy rains and floods.
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