How do you select prevention and mitigation strategies?
As we saw in Topic 4, when studying potential problem analysis, there are a finite number of preventative actions or strategies for a given number of problems caused by hazards. Even so, it may not be necessary, or even possible, to initiate all of the possible strategies—the expense and inconvenience would be prohibitive. Therefore, you will have to select the most appropriate out of the set of possible strategies.
You have previously read that Davis and Gupta (pages 57 to 64 in Disaster Mitigation in Asia and the Pacific) have suggested ten principles that can aid in the formulation of prevention and mitigation strategies, but once you have formulated the strategies, how do you choose the strategy that is right for you and for your situation?
Obviously you want to select the best prevention and mitigation strategies for a given hazard or group of hazards. But what does 'best' mean? One way of selecting a course of action is to carefully describe the objectives that the action must satisfy—these objectives can be used as decision-making criteria, very similar in fact to the way we determined the risk evaluation criteria in our risk assessment/ hazard analysis project.
For example, one criterion that you will probably all encounter is cost. In other words, in objective terms, the selected strategy must be cost-effective.
The table below lists some excellent decision criteria for selecting between possible strategies or courses of action.
Table 5.1: Criteria for evaluating mitigation strategies
Criteria |
Strategy-related questions |
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Do those responsible for creating the hazard pay for its reduction? Where there is no man-made cause, is the cost of response fairly distributed? |
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Will the beneficial effects of this strategy be quickly realised? |
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Will the application of this strategy lead to further risk-reducing actions by others? |
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Is this strategy the most cost-effective or could the same results be achieved more cheaply by other means? |
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Can it be easily administered or will its application be neglected because of difficulty of administration or lack of expertise? |
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Will the effects of the application of this strategy be continuous or merely short term? |
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How compatible is this strategy with others that may be adopted? |
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Does this level of government have the legislated authority to apply this strategy? If not, can higher levels be 'encouraged' to? |
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What will be the economic impacts of this strategy? |
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What will be the environmental impacts of this strategy? |
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Will this strategy itself introduce new risks? |
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What proportion of the losses due to this hazard will this strategy prevent? Will it allow the safety goal to be reached? |
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Are there likely to be adverse reactions to implementation? |
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Does this strategy deny basic rights? |
Source: Foster, H.D. (1980). Disaster planning: the preservation of life and property, Springer-Verlag, Berlin, p. 28.
The criteria in Table 5.1 can apply not only to government bodies and administrative areas, but also to private sector activities.
However, they may not be in a priority order that suits you, nor will they apply to all situations that require prevention and mitigation, nor is it necessarily a complete list.
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I would like you now to do two things: |
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Re-order the criteria from Table 5.1 (adding in those that you have thought of) in priority order (i.e. '1' is the most important or relevant criterion) that you believe suits the hazards you examined in your risk assessment/ hazard analysis and that suits the environment in which the hazards exist. |
2. |
Select two possible prevention and mitigation strategies that address a risk/ hazard you have analysed, and see how well each meets these criteria. |
Please use the following Table 5.2 as a worksheet. Either print it up and use it as a hard copy or copy it to a new electronic document and input the required data there. Write in the name of the hazards, and the name of the two strategies. Your selection and ordering of these selection criteria will assist you greatly in the following work on resource needs analysis, which forms the basis of the next three topics, and of much of your final assignment work, your emergency management plan.
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Carter, Disaster management: A disaster manager's handbook, Ch. 14 (pp. 203-8). |
This reading provides a practical context to mitigation, by explaining its connection to development planning, emergency management policy and legislation, and emergency planning. Using this reading and the other information you have gained in this topic answer the following questions:
Please consider the questions and attempt to answer them before clicking on the "answer" box. If you find that you can’t answer or are still unclear, please review the specific section of this topic before continuing.
Describe the difference between 'structural' and 'non-structural' mitigation measures.
Have a look at Foster's table of criteria for evaluating mitigation strategies (page 5-10 of this topic). Does number 12, on hazard reduction potential, actually describe this criteria in sufficient detail? Which of the 'Ten Guiding Principles of Disaster Mitigation' on page 57 of Disaster Mitigation in Asia and the Pacific could be used to enhance Foster's twelfth criteria?
Why is there a need to have an appropriate balance between prevention and other aspects of emergency management?