Bangladesh is a country most affected by extreme weather events in the last two decades, reveals the Global Climate Risk Index (CRI), 2012.
For the period 1991-2010, Bangladesh was followed by Myanmar and Honduras, the report said.
However, Bangladesh is not on the list of the 10 worst affected countries in 2010.
The report, titled “Global Climate Risk Index 2012”, was published yesterday in Durban, South Africa, at the UN Climate Change Conference.
Germanwatch, a Germany-based NGO that works in the areas of food, agricultural and climate change, analysed the quantified impacts of extreme weather events both in terms of fatalities as well as economic losses due to weather-related events.
This year’s analysis underlines the fact that the less developed countries are generally more affected than the industrialised ones.
Last year’s most affected countries were Pakistan, Guatemala and Colombia. They were followed by Russia, Honduras and Oman.
All the ten most affected countries in the 1991-2010 period were developing countries.
All these countries were hit by different weather related events, including hurricanes, floods and heat wave.
On an average, 7,814 people died each year in 251 instances of extreme weather conditions in Bangladesh during the period, causing damage of $2,091 million a year that led to a 1.56 percent GDP loss.
In total, more than 7,10,000 people died as a direct consequence of more than 14,000 extreme weather events, and losses of more than $2.3 trillion occurred from 1991 to 2010.
Except for Russia, none of the 20 countries most vulnerable to natural disasters are developed nations.
-With The Daily Star input
