This article published in Business World (January 25, 2018) entitled, “How Well Do Countries Cope with Losses Due to Natural Disasters?” based on World Bank’s Unbreakable Report compares countries according to “socioeconomic resilience”, defined as a country’s ability to minimize impact of losses on well-being due to natural disaster. Resilience is expressed as a ratio of the yearly average of asset losses to well-being losses (equivalent to loss in consumption). This is premised on a country’s welfare impact extending beyond damage to properties and loss of lives.
The report shows the Philippines as having socioeconomic resilience score of 69%. This means that $1 worth of asset losses due to natural disaster has the same impact on well-being as $1.45 reduction in consumption. (Source: Unbreakable: Building resilience of the Poor in the Face of Natural Disaster, World Bank 2017; Business World).
