Estimating the direct economic damage of the earthquake in Haiti

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|a FI13010907

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|a Estimating the direct economic damage of the earthquake in Haiti |h [electronic resource] |y English.

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|a Washington, D.C. : |b Inter-American Development Bank (IDB), |c 2012-02.

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|a 16 p. : |b digital, PDF file.

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|a Inter-American Development Bank working paper series, 163 |n IDB-WP-163 |y English.

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|a Title from title caption (viewed March 30, 2010). "February 2010"

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|a This paper may be freely reproduced provided credit is given to the Inter-American Development Bank.

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|a Cavallo, E. A., Powell, A., & Becerra, O. (2010). Estimating the direct economic damage of the earthquake in Haiti. Inter-American Development Bank (IDB).

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|a The document’s main function is to provide a preliminary approximation of the direct costs associated with the January 12, 2010 magnitude 7.0 earthquake that struck Haiti 10 miles southwest of the country’s capital city, Port-au-Prince. The researchers utilize historical data on catastrophic events along with regression analysis to estimate what the costs of such an event would be based on Haiti’s economic and demographic profile. This work is intended to put the disaster in perspective in terms of the enormity of the challenge faced by those who will be involved in the rebuilding process. They use 2,000 natural catastrophic events (primarily earthquakes/tsunamis, floods, and windstorms) between 1970 and 2008 from the Emergency Events Database (EM-DAT) to do their analysis. The damage total is a function of the number of people dead or missing, level of economic development, the country’s size (population, real GDP, or land area), and other regionally specific variables. Their regression shows that estimated damages increase greatly with the intensity of the event, economic development, and country size. Richer countries, which often tend to be bigger countries, have greater amounts of wealth exposed to disaster. This is mitigated by their findings that countries with higher income per capita experience fewer economic losses as a result of disasters, their explanation being that economic development often leads to mitigation against natural disasters and less vulnerable populations. Using the 250,000 dead figure, it is estimated that about US$8.1 billion in damages was caused to the Haitian economy by the January 12th earthquake. The researchers note that a figure as high as US$13.9 billion is within statistical error. They do caution that there are a number of potential issues with these estimates. It is not clear if past events will be relevant to the case of Haiti since every event is somewhat unique. Also, the Haiti earthquake is particularly distinct due to its place in the country’s historical record. Never has such a large proportion of the population been killed in such an event, nor has the capital city been destroyed in such a fashion. The researchers emphasize that the scope of reconstruction will be beyond the capacity of any one organization or country, and thus coordination will be critical. They propose using multilateral organizations as coordination nodes, and the establishment of aggregate funds based on particular themes to help facilitate the planning and funding of projects. They caution against the use of tied aid as a potential hindrance to efficient reconstruction.

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|a Disasters and Economics

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|a Table of Content: 1. Introduction p. 2, 2. Model Specification and Methodology p.4, 3. Regression Results p.5, 4. Out-of-Sample Prediction for Haiti p. 10, 5. Implications of the Results p.13, 6. Conclusions p.14, References p. 16.

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|a Natural hazards and disasters |z Haiti |x Earthquakes.

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|a Economic impact analysis |z Haiti.

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|a Aid and development |z Haiti.

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|a Haiti. |2 tgn

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|a Cavallo, Eduardo A. |u Research Department (RES), Inter-American Development Bank (IDB). |4 cre

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|a Powell, Andrew |g Regional Economic Advisor for the Caribbean Department (CCB) |u Inter-American Development Bank (IDB). |4 cre

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|a Becerra, Oscar |u Research Department (RES), Inter-American Development Bank (IDB). |4 cre

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|a Inter-American Development Bank. Research Dept.. |4 ctb

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|a Disaster Risk Reduction Program, Florida International University (DRR/FIU), |e summary contributor.

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|c Original |w (OCoLC)589809818

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|a dpSobek.

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|u http://dpanther.fiu.edu/dpService/dpPurlService/purl/FI13010907/00001 |y Click here for full text

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