Coexistent to this plan, is one by which they could open up embankments further up the river allowing massive flood planes for controlled flooding, to flood that are less densely populated to relieve the lower course of the river, of discharge and sediment. This management scheme, to reduce the affects of heavy monsoon rains has also been proposed with the idea of planting trees in the Himalayas, in Nepal and India where massive amounts of deforestation has taken place, increasing the sediment load of the river and building up the river beds in the delta making it more likely to flood. The most likely and affordable method however appears to be flood forecasting using satellites, mixed with self helping with escape centres up hills and specially designed schools for locals to take refuge in.
Nevertheless, there is much conflict over these proposals since they seem to favour the rich city dwellers. Though at the moment, no defences have been carried forward except building rat wrecked embankments in this country where, most of the countries development budget has to be spent on the impact of floods making it the 146th poorest country in the world.
Drought, depending on which definition of the term you use can or cannot be controlled. If a drought is when a country suffers a shortfall in rainfall, than it cannot be controlled, though in Omaha, they have attempted this by cloud seeding, though this has not been proven to work. However, many people refer to drought in the hydrological context which can be controlled, quiet easily, though requiring many resources and so only affecting poorer countries. In the Sahel, 100’000 people died in 1973 due to drought, this drought is a perfect example of bad control as the drought was augmented substantially due to people changing there crops to rain fed agriculture and increasing their crop size due to ‘good’ rainfall in the 1950’s and 1960’s. This was not helped by the government who made people grow more cash crops which are rain reliant to earn more money, increasing the amount of rain fed crops, and reducing the amount of nomadic herding which was adapted to uncertain and irregular rainfall. This has been made worse by the fact that 90% of wood is used for firewood increasing the albedo affect of the earth and reducing rainfall further. All these controlling factors help increase the likelihood of drought and famine, and are all controlled by humans.
However, since droughts have ravaged the Sahel the people and government have had to manage the problem to reduce its adverse affects having been too late to stop it. This has ranged from a micro scale of locals to a national scale. People in the Sahel, to survive the drought have developed several ways of handling with the drought, these include; selling livestock, wage labour, borrowing cash for food from relatives and selling valuables. Repeated crop failures will eventually, result in the loss of all resources and eventual out-migration. The government has also, helped to manage the drought by carefully, conserving food stocks, using supplementary food supplies from aid agencies, careful seed drilling to use pockets of moisture in the soil, the use of drought resistant crops and flexibility, meaning that instant crop plantation can take place after a storm to reap the benefits.
All these things will reduce the affects of the drought, as long as it does not last too long, though famine will still occur. It is obvious that it is more beneficial for a country not to ignore the fact that it is at risk of drought and preparing, as it is unlikely that 140’000 people had to die if there had been a previous 20 years of good rainfall before the drought, meaning that the government and people had ignored the controlling factors which cause famine. It is also fair to state that countries based on subsistence farming are more at risk from drought, and richer countries never suffer to this extent from drought, due to the great control they have, with dams being built and having massive dams with backup aquifers, with the closest thing to a drought occurring in Britain, involving a hose pipe ban.
This shows that the controlling factors are the best way of reducing the effects of a natural hazard as is demonstrated by MEDC‘s, though they are unlikely to be affected by drought even if they abuse these since they can afford to get aid for themselves. However it can also be viewed through Earthquakes how management in MEDC’s can reduce the effects of this nebula which can only be controlled slightly, whilst in poorer countries where close to no management takes place and people just have to sit it out, and the death toll can be over 100 times greater than in an MEDC.
In San Francisco a 7.1 Richter earth quake occurred in 1989 causing the deaths of 63 people, this can be contrasted to Iran the next year where a 7.7 Richter eruption caused the deaths of 50’000. This change in mortality is based purely on management by rich countries, because though they found it possible to calm the earthquakes in Los Angeles by pouring sea water into the fault, this is unique as it is not even possible to predict Earthquakes yet, though hazard areas can be deduced by looking at where fault lines are and so where management has to take place.
In Los Angeles, to reduce the effects of any Earthquakes all buildings have to be shock resistant meaning they are not affected by resonance in the Earth, allowing the energy to dissipate, out of the building stopping them from cracking or braking. This can greatly improve the chances of survival as the earthquake in Turkey which caused 20’000 deaths, caused so many mainly due to corruption in the government, taking bribes from developers who were not building, government building and normal buildings to Earthquake specifications. Also in Los Angeles they have very good transport links and have fleets of helicopters who can bring aid and help almost immediately, meaning that very few people will die in the aftermath, trapped in buildings and due to disease.
So to conclude, there are many ways of controlling, and managing hazards, and if the amount of resources put in is adequate it is possible to reduce the affects of any hazard to almost nil. As in America, even when there is no way, currently in our technological grasp of controlling some hazards, death and destruction can still be kept to a minimum through management. This can be see in poor countries where mismanagement by governments who are trying to make more money, taking a big risk and putting the interest of their people on line, can make hazards worse, having the opposite effect.
Michael John Rodriguez from Bow
El Toro