Climate Events and Disaster Mitigation from Policy to Practice

‘Climate Change’ is a matter of great concern at the global level since it is leading to causing weather-related disasters and in making communities more vulnerable to the effects of disasters. There is need for disaster mitigation measures to reduce or if possible, totally eliminate the impacts and risks of hazards through proactive measures taken before an emergency or disaster occurs. For alleviating the risk of disaster due to severe climate events, there has been a growing need for a concrete platform to educate and train the individuals and entities in the developing world and network with them to act beyond the disaster management policies. Keeping this in view, the NAM S&T Centre in partnership with the National Science & Technology Commission (NASTEC) of Sri Lanka organised an international workshop on ‘Mitigation of Disasters due to Severe Climate Events: From Policy to Practice’ in Colombo, Sri Lanka during 10-13 March 2016. The workshop was attended by 64 senior professionals from 19 countries - Cambodia, Egypt, Hungary, India, Indonesia, Iran, Malaysia, Mauritius, Myanmar, Nepal, Nigeria, Pakistan, Palestine, Thailand, Uganda, Venezuela, Zambia and Zimbabwe, and the host country Sri Lanka for sharing views and experiences for the development of a road map for reducing the risks in real situations. The present book edited by Prof. Joaquin Alejandro Linayo Rivero, Prof. Jayant K. Routray and Prof. Biswajeet Pradhan is a follow up of the Colombo Workshop comprising 17 scientific and technical papers contributed by the experts from 15 countries. The book is expected to be useful to all those associated with mitigation of disasters due to severe climate events, from researchers to policy makers, non government organisations and government officials in the developing countries.