Publications & Research

We provide a platform between researchers, disaster practitioners, healthcare professionals and students for expertise exchange, collaboration and policy discussion.

Publications & Research

The HKJCDPRI Publications Section contains collaborative researches and publications with our partners and renowned academic institutions, and other research and development projects related to disaster preparedness and response.

The Guidelines section contains our selected collection of technical information, operational guidelines and useful tools for disaster management.

The Blog sub-section provides a platform where our team and peers share news and updates, as well as opinions and experiences in building disaster preparedness for the communities.

The blog posts are written by the author in his own personal capacity / affiliation stated. The views, thoughts and opinions expressed in the post belong solely to the author and does not necessarily represent those of Hong Kong Jockey Club Disaster Preparedness and Response Institute.

All resources listed here are freely and publicly available, unless specified otherwise. We ask users to use them with respect and credit the authors as appropriate.

2020

29/06/2020

作好準備，迎接一個戴口罩的夏季！

[This article is only available in Chinese.]

截至2020年6月中，全球2019冠狀病毒疾病（COVID-19）染病人數已突破8百萬人，而死亡人數則超過45萬，雖然全球多個地方的新增個案已受到控制，而在本港更多時沒有新增本地個案，但外出時需要戴口罩的措施似乎仍需維持一段日子。今年，相信世界各地都需要過一個戴口罩的夏季!

The Global Risks Report 2020 Cover - WEF

08/05/2020

WEF Global Risk Report 2020 Highlights Impact of Climate Change on Disease

At a critical time when collective action is essential to correct the failures of climate change, biodiversity loss and infectious disease, nations are more fragmented than ever. The 15th edition of the World Economic Forum’s Global Risks Report has been published as the world stands at the brink of unprecedented climate-related emergencies. The report calls for a multi-stakeholder approach, cautioning that opting to ride out the current period in the hope that the global system will “snap back” runs the risk of missing crucial windows to address pressing challenges.

The report connects ten of the most crucial risks over the coming decade to climate change. These include extreme weather, climate action failure, natural disasters, biodiversity loss, human-made environmental disasters, data fraud or theft, cyberattacks, water crises, global governance failures and asset bubbles.

Climate change is striking harder and more rapidly than expected. Record-breaking temperatures, increasingly frequent natural disasters, and as-yet unknown risks (likely including extreme loss of life, stress on ecosystems, increased migration, exacerbation of geopolitical tensions, trade, labour and supply chain disruption) threaten irreversible harm. Scientists, politicians, and grassroots groups are calling for swift and effective action in the form of a Green New Deal, agreeing that we must limit global temperature rise to 1.5 degrees by the end of the century.

Beyond the direct impact of climate change, the report points out that destabilising tipping points in nature could exacerbate the social and economic consequences of climate risk. Human-imposed extinction rates are off the charts; and the stress our actions have put on our ecosystem alters Earth’s land surface and impacts ocean area, pollutes habitats and our food chain, introduces non-indigenous species that edge out native ones and obliterates masses of insect populations, coral reefs and phytoplankton. Scientists are calling for a return to nature to explore new therapeutic opportunities -- efforts that are threatened by biodiversity loss.

In Hong Kong, climate change has manifested itself in the form of increasing numbers of severe weather events in recent years. Super Typhoon Hato battered Hong Kong in August 2017 with wind gusts of up to 193 km/h, and went on to cause direct economic loss in excess of HKD38 billion in Macao, as well as in Guangdong, Guangxi, Fujian, Guizhou and Yannan.[1] It was followed by Super Typhoon Mangkhut, which impacted Guam, the Philippines, Hong Kong and Southern China in September 2018. The fifth tropical cyclone to affect Hong Kong that year, Mangkhut injured at least 458 people in the SAR, and paralyzed sea, land and air transportation services with destruction caused by heavy rain, storm surges and high waves.[2]

It is anticipated that climate change will continue to accelerate the frequency of severe weather events on a global scale. In the context of Hong Kong, this highlights the need to examine not only the direct impact of typhoons and other events, but also their indirect impact on critical infrastructure such as transportation networks and nuclear power plants. However, the current global COVID-19 pandemic has also highlighted the need to prepare for emergency situations beyond extreme weather events – raising awareness for another set of potential risks and mitigating preparations.

Aiming to build Hong Kong’s disaster resilience, the Hong Kong Jockey Club Disaster Preparedness and Response Institute (HKJCDPRI) was established in 2014 to provide a platform for comprehensive training, capacity building, research, policy discussion and knowledge exchange. Working to prepare the community for both short-term and long-term impacts of climate change, HKJCDPRI creates learning opportunities for disaster practitioners and the general public – sharing knowledge regarding a range of topics, from disaster preparedness to disease prevention.

For more details, please view the full report on The World Economic Forum’s Global Risks Report 2020.

[1] http://www.hko.gov.hk/en/informtc/hato17/report.htm

[2] http://www.hko.gov.hk/en/informtc/mangkhut18/report.htm

23/01/2020

Barriers and enablers in the long term recovery of communities affected by natural hazards: a review of the literature

[本文只供英語版本]

Four phases of disaster management are well-established in disaster related literature. The phases are emergency relief, recovery and reconstruction, mitigation, and preparedness. Long-term recovery is the process of restoring a community to a stable and functional state. An effective long-term recovery support to disaster-impacted communities enables the community to restore, redevelop and revitalise the environmental, social, economic fabric of the community and build resilience. Recovery should begin during response and aim to return the disaster-impacted area to pre-disaster status, or even better than before.

The report “Barriers and enablers in the long term recovery of communities affected by natural hazards: A review of the literature” , published by the Bushfire and Natural Hazards CRC, reviewed Australian and international literature on the long term recovery of communities that have been impacted by natural hazards. The review identified the barriers and the enablers of effective long term recovery. The key findings are:

Research into disaster recovery has been dominated by research on disaster planning, prevention and response, and there has been a dearth of research on long term recovery. Thus research needs to focus on long term recovery as the costs, both financial and social, are significant.

Recovery in the long term is a complex process with no clear end point. The process is not linear from short term to long term recovery, and nor are the same actors involved in short term and long term recovery.

Local communities and their associated capitals are the core of successful recovery and thus community engagement needs to be central to immediate, short, medium and long term recovery policy and practice.

There is a need for a greater focus on restoration of environment and the community in line with the traditional response to restoration of the built environment.

Importantly there is a need to develop national monitoring and evaluation framework for long term recovery as most evaluations focus on the immediate response and short term response and lack consistency.

For full report, please visit this link: https://www.bnhcrc.com.au/publications/biblio/bnh-6568

By Hong Kong Jockey Club Disaster Preparedness and Response Institute

23/12/2019

World Disaster Report 2018 - Leaving No One Behind, Published

[中文翻譯版本即將推出]

The first World Disaster Report was published in 1993 with the aims of bringing up the latest trends, facts and anlysis of comtemporary disasters and the impact of disasters on vulnerable people in the globe. It is convened by the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) annually to bring together researchers, humanitarian workers and various experts to highlight the most imperative emerging issues as a key reference document for disaster management practitioners.

The first World Disaster Report was published in 1993 with the aims of bringing up the latest trends, facts and anlysis of comtemporary disasters and the impact of disasters on vulnerable people in the globe. It is convened by the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) annually to bring together researchers, humanitarian workers and various experts to highlight the most imperative emerging issues as a key reference document for disaster management practitioners.

With a theme of "Leave No One Behind", the 2018 World Disaster Report lays out the problem that vulnerable people with significant humanitarian needs are left behind by the humanitarian sector in some situations. The report tries to examine the factors which cause the most vulnerable communities to be missed out, i.e. why they are "out of sight". The five factors that the report describes as the reasons of missing out those people in need of assistance are summarised in the diagram shown below. Apart from these five reasons, the report looks into the factors that inhibit the presence of internationally funded humanitarian assistance in the emergency field. These factors include: political, security and physical environment issues.

The five factors that the report describes as the reasons of missing out those people in need of assistance (source: IFRC World Disaster Report 2018)

The report sets out recommendations in six main areas, and addresses specific calls to action in each area to government, international humanitarian organisations and donors. It also calls for a more conscious and transparent approach to ensuring the people in greatest needs will be prioritised for humanitarian assistance. The six main areas of recommendations are: