Why natural calamities occur

People who farm, rear livestock, or live a nomadic lifestyle are struggling to feed their families. Climate shocks bring devastating and long-term effects, often forcing them to move away into cities. Natural disasters. Read on to learn more about why natural disasters might not be so natural after all. Hazards are inevitable — but the impact they have on society is not. They wreak havoc in poor and vulnerable communities and cost billions in recovery and aid funding.

These disasters happen when a natural hazard — such as a cyclone, bushfire or earthquake — damages human systems. They seem to be becoming more frequent and worse — but are they really? Some natural hazards occur because of forces outside our control. Variation in solar radiation entering the atmosphere and oceans triggers storms in the summertime and blizzards in winter.

First, humanity is interfering with the Earth system. For example, as we drive anthropogenic climate change we are adding more energy to the system. Second, we are mis managing natural systems. For example, removing the buffering protection of mangroves on the coast means a storm surge can be more disastrous. This exposes us to harm and loss when the inevitable happens. It estimates that crop and livestock production loss in the least developed countries and low to middle-income countries between and was equivalent to a loss of 6.

This equals the annual calorie intake of seven million adults. The report argues that investing in resilience and disaster risk reduction, especially data gathering and analysis for evidence-informed action, is of paramount importance to ensure agriculture's crucial role in achieving a sustainable future.

The UN chief urged countries to make sure they invest the funds necessary to prevent and manage disasters, in a solemn message of remembrance on Wednesday for the 18, people who died or are unaccounted for, due to the earthquake and tsunami that struck Japan exactly ten years ago.

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