ArriveNet (press release), CO
When hurricane Mitch devastated Miami in 1992, the U.S. attention shifted from disaster relief to disaster prevention. Although much has been done in terms of hazard mitigation since then, there is still a long way to go.
Neither the US, nor the vast majority of countries, has a comprehensive programme for quantitative and uniform evaluation and mitigation of natural disasters. The American solution is on state level, voluntary, and without common standards.
In contrast, Nicaragua has a national system for universal description of natural hazards. Dr Ulf Erlingsson led the project that implemented the system, based on a Geographic Information System, in 2002. The expert system, named HazMit for Hazard Mitigation, was designed to allow quantitative and objective comparisons of all natural risks. Risk is expressed as lives or economic value lost per year as a long-term average.
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