Poverty and famine: An essay on entitlement and deprivation

Abstract

The study sought to build on earlier work by identifying factors associated with the frequency of natural disasters and the resulting mortality. Countries prone to natural disasters in the decade 1970–1979 continued to be so in the next two decades. Geophysical factors (e.g., whether landlocked, size of country) had an important role in explaining inter-country variations in the occurrence of natural disasters. Deaths varied with the number of disasters; they also varied with (lagged) deaths in the previous decade; poor countries suffered more deaths; and, controlling for these and other effects, larger countries suffered more deaths. The payoff from learning from experience is high; even moderate learning can save a large number of lives. Growth acceleration helps avert deaths through more resources for disaster prevention and mitigation capabilities. A challenge for development assistance is to combine growth acceleration with speedy relief and a durable reduction in vulnerability to natural disasters.