ΕλληνικάKeywords
floods, climate change, population increase, early warning, developing countries, less-developed countries, monitoring, forecastingAbstract
In terms of human impact, frequency and economic loss, floods are amongst the biggest natural disasters worldwide. Climate change, population increase, urbanizationand land use changes continue to increase their effects globally especially in coastal cities. Without adequate warning and preparation, recovery from future floods events is expected to become more costly and prolonged than need be. In Europe, it has been estimated that hydro-meteorological information and early warning systems save hundreds of lives and avoid between 460 million and 2.7 billion Euros of disaster losses per year (World Bank, 2012).The potential for similar benefits for developing and less developed countries is estimated to be between 4 and 36 billion USD per year. However, not all nations, especially in developing and less developed countries, have adequate national flood monitoring and forecasting systems in place: these are expensive to set up and maintain, require specifichydrological knowledge, institutional setting as well as training and, in the case of international rivers, require collaboration between countries. With increased availability of in-situ and remote sensing data, and new generations of weather and flood forecasting models, building global flood forecasting and monitoring systems is now feasible. Several prototype systems have already been developed. Such systems are able to provide information useful for operational response and flood risk management. They can be coupled as well with regional, advanced lead-time, prediction systems that may be in part based on international weather models and data products. However, although reliable international predictive capacity has been demonstrated, it is implementation that is lacking.The international community can foster in-country capacity building in developing and less-developed countries through sharing technological know-how. It can also build upon existing expensive components of early warning systems (e.g. earth observation and global weather forecasts) to provide satellite-and model-based monitoring and prediction systems that deliver a common infrastructure for regional systems to build upon, and thereby develop common objective standards and goals for improved flood forecasting and monitoring. In addition, and critically, international humanitarian organizations also stand to benefit from the best-available tools to adequately prepare and respond to disaster in those situations where flood events overwhelm in-country capabilities. Both improved in-country capacity and the global infrastructure are thus necessary.URL
https://gfp.jrc.ec.europa.eu/sites/default/files/2017-06/Concept%20Paper%20Global%20Flood%20Partnership%20v4.3.pdfFlood management measure
One or more flood management measures to which this source is related (if applicable).
Last modified: July 7, 2020, 4:34 p.m.
