Anthropogenic Factors in Controlling the Natural Hazards

8/8/2019 Anthropogenic Factors in Controlling the Natural Hazards

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Anthropogenic factors in controlling the natural disasters

Abstract

During the ultimate years, Indonesia is hit by many natural disasters. The last earthquake even

rattled the south of the island of Sumatra just couple weeks ago. To refresh our mind, it is noneed to go too far to name the annual and last flood in Jakarta about half a year ago, the burningof the forest a year ago and the volcano activities of Mt. Merapi in Java.The natural phenomenon is any non artificial event caused by the forces of nature. A Natural

Hazard is an unexpected or uncontrollable natural event of unusual magnitude that threatens theactivities of people or people themselves. A Natural Disaster is a natural hazard event thatactually resulted in widespread destruction of property or caused injury and/or death.The main factor that induces the phenomena is the forces of nature: tectonic activity and

precipitation are among them. But recently, with the increment of the population, the most popular triggering factor is the anthropogenic factor. The environment is prone to change byitself, but the human activities alter the tendency of the environment.The anthropogenic land use nowadays is a problem in many places in the world. It gives a greatimpact to the environment. Unfortunately, the negative impact is the one suffered by theecosystem as well as the socioeconomic impacts suffered by the society. And because of our dependency on the environment, we have to live with the consequences. Through an earlier awareness of the importance of the nature and also the responsibility towards the environment,we can anticipate the disaster and improve the mitigation, which many times we are notconscious of its significance, for the survival of our life and country. That is the reason why thecampaign of saving the earth should be started in the individual level and should be a nationalcampaign plan to improve our society.

Keywords : natural hazards, disasters, anthropogenic activities, environment, socioeconomicimpact.


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Introduction

In the last century, Indonesia is one of the most affected countries by the natural disaster. Everytime, the news reaches us with something new, the disaster that unheard before. Actually thenatural phenomenon wont turn its name to a natural disaster until it shows serious impact on

human being and the environment. This impact is usually being quantified with the loss of lifeand also the welfare.The natural phenomenon is any non artificial event caused by the forces of nature. A Natural

Hazard is an unexpected or uncontrollable natural event of unusual magnitude that threatens theactivities of people or people themselves. A Natural Disaster is a natural hazard event thatactually resulted in widespread destruction of property or caused injury and/or death.There are several types of these phenomena regarded as natural disaster since they have shown

being destructive both to human and environment. Two trusted sources have listed some of thenatural phenomena that are considered as natural disasters. The inventory of USGS has thosecalled natural hazards to point to the phenomena: earthquakes, floods, hurricanes, landslides,tsunamis, volcanoes and wildfire. On the other hand, National Geographic lists somethingsimilar but a little bit different as natural disasters: avalanches, hurricanes, tornadoes, volcanoes,earthquakes, lightning, tsunamis.Checking through the list, we can make sure that almost all the hazards or disasters occur withhigh intensity in Indonesia. Just to skip the one caused or induced by the force of the wind-tornadoes, hurricanes and the other by the snow and rock- avalanches, Indonesia has to live withall others disasters.Since Indonesia is located in the Ring of fire, with the activity of the tectonic plates, andmoreover is a tropical country, the hazards caused by rainfall, tectonic and volcanic activity arenot strange phenomena for Indonesia. The earthquake, the volcano eruption and floods alsolandslides are among those happen with most frequent in Indonesia.The data from the Colombia University showed that Indonesia, especially Sumatra and Java, is

prone to the natural hazards due to the geologic and climatic condition of the area(http://www.ldeo.columbia.edu/chrr/research/profiles/pdfs/indonesia_profile1.pdf ).The other reality is the existence of drought as one of the natural disaster in Indonesia, besidesthe flood. Taking into account that Indonesia is a country affected by the monsoon, which bringdry weather during the (June to September), influenced by the Australian continental air masses,and a rainy season (December to March) as is the result of mainland Asia and Pacific Ocean air masses, this is not strange at all. But the precipitation in Indonesia is among the highest in theworld, there must be another factors provoking the phenomena. The fact shows that thedistribution is one of the problems, besides the socioeconomic condition.

Data of the events as well as affected area and loss of life in Indonesia
http://www.ldeo.columbia.edu/chrr/research/profiles/pdfs/indonesia_profile1.pdfhttp://www.ldeo.columbia.edu/chrr/research/profiles/pdfs/indonesia_profile1.pdf


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(Source: http://www.ldeo.columbia.edu/chrr/research/profiles/indonesia.html)


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2. Methodology

The methodology to carry out the analysis of the natural disasters in Indonesia is based onrevising the bibliographies published worldwide upon this subject. Some principal conclusionscan be deduced from the analyses of several events followed.

3. Types of natural disasters

There is a long list to cover all the natural hazards or disasters that happen in this world. But for Indonesia, the list can be cut shorter, since the main forces of nature that control Indonesia islimited especially by the geologic and geomorphologic formation of Indonesia.Indonesia, the biggest archipelago in the world, is one of the most disaster-prone countries in theworld. Almost every year at least one of the natural disasters happens in Indonesia. The widelyscattered islands of Indonesia have their own microclimate and particular social and economicsas well as political conditions.Indonesia lies between the Ring of Fire-Pacific Ring of Fire , an area of frequent earthquakes andvolcanic eruptions encircling the basin of the Pacific Ocean , along the northeastern islandsadjacent to and including New Guinea and the Alpide belt along the south and west fromSumatra, Java, Bali, Flores, and Timor .

Therefore, the list of the hazards can be displayed as followed:a. Volcanoes: Indonesia contains more active volcanoes than any country on earth. According tothe database of the Smitsonian Institute, there are 146 Holocene volcanoes and 4 Pleistocenevolcanoes with thermal activity in Indonesia. Of the others active volcanoes, Mt. Merapi is themost active and during the last decades, had caused many mortality during its eruption.

b. Flood: Every year there is at least one flood happens in Indonesia, especially in Jakarta as aconsequence of an urbanization problem. This is not including the others events in the other partof Indonesia that the flood triggers the erosion and landslide.c. Earthquake and tsunami: Since 2004, the tsunami triggered by the underwater earthquake,almost every year, especially in Sumatra and Java, there are some earthquakes recorded with therange of scale from 4-7 Richter scale.d. Landslide: This movement of rock, debris or earth down slope is triggering especially by theearthquake and high precipitation in Indonesia.e. Drought: The summer in Indonesia is getting worse each year and many part of Indonesia willsuffer from a long drought.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earthquakehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volcanichttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pacific_Oceanhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Guineahttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Balihttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Floreshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timorhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earthquakehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volcanichttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pacific_Oceanhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Guineahttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Balihttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Floreshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timor


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(Source: http://pubs.usgs.gov/gip/dynamic/fire.html )

Dry season from May to September (southeast monsoon)
http://pubs.usgs.gov/gip/dynamic/fire.htmlhttp://pubs.usgs.gov/gip/dynamic/fire.htmlhttp://pubs.usgs.gov/gip/dynamic/fire.html


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Transition season from wet to dry from October to November

Wet season from December to March (northwest monsoon)

Data from average rainfalls for the years 1947-98, the gradation of grey( from clear to dark one)colour show the precipitation < 200mm / 200 - 400mm / 400 - 800mm / > 800mm (Kirono,1999).(Source: http://www.starfish.ch/dive/map/Indonesia-weather-map.html Teresa Zubi)
http://www.starfish.ch/dive/map/Indonesia-weather-map.htmlhttp://www.starfish.ch/dive/map/Indonesia-weather-map.htmlhttp://www.starfish.ch/dive/map/Indonesia-weather-map.html


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4. The anthropogenic factors vs. the natural forces

Without human, there is no disaster (OKeefe in Adger, 1999).

Natural factors:

Among others natural factors, the most important ones are the precipitation and earthquake. Thevariation and fluctuation in rainfall control the flood and drought that happen in Indonesia. Theearthquake can trigger other hazard such as landslide and tsunami.

a. PrecipitationPrecipitation is the main triggering factor of many disasters in Indonesia. In the last decades,many floods, landslide and even drought recorded in Indonesia because of the change of the

pattern of rainfall. This is one of the consequences of the climate change. High precipitation will be an advantage if it can be saved to be used in the dry season. But the fact is we got too muchwater in the rainy season and lack of water in the dry seasonFor any analysis, the series of rainfall data are very important. From a longer recorded data, wecan get a better result for the return period of the rainfall that serve as a threshold in anticipatingthe hazards. But a careful attention is needed due to the climate change. Besides the statisticsanalysis, a model predicting future pattern of rainfall needs to be considered.But the challenge is the model existing still cant give a satisfactory result.

b. EarthquakeThis is another triggering factor of the disasters that happen in Indonesia. Regarding to theexistence of the volcanoes in Indonesia, volcanic earthquake as well as tectonic earthquake needa serious attention for the mitigation.

Socioeconomic assessment and the anthropogenic factors:For the analysis of socioeconomic, the term vulnerability is important for the analysis of theimpact of the disaster. The impacts depend on the condition of the society: the economic, politicand social condition. According to Blaikie et al., vulnerability is the characteristics of a person or group in terms of their capacity to anticipate, cope with, resist, and recover from the impact of anatural hazard (Blaikie et al., Pg. 9, 1994). This definition places people as the focus of disaster assessment by clearly separating the natural event from the concept of vulnerability (Adger andKelly, 2000). They conclude that vulnerability is the ability or inability of individuals and socialgroupings to respond to, in the sense of cope with, recover from or adapt to, any external stress

placed on their livelihoods and well-being(Adger and Kelly, Pg. 328, 2000).There are two kinds of vulnerability introduced to asses the disaster: the collective and the

individual vulnerability. Collective vulnerability of a nation, region or community is determined by institutional and market structures, such as the prevalence of informal and formal socialsecurity and insurance, and by infrastructure and income (Adger, Pg. 252, 1999). A person or groups access to land, steady income, and public services measures the individual level of vulnerability (Bakrim, H., 1998).Using this approach in disaster assessment, we move away from the impact, or intensity of adisaster, and begin to assess a situation in terms of conditions already well established within asociety. These conditions are determined by the socio-economic and political nature of thatsociety. This changes the intervention methods from technological advancement into policyreform.Vulnerability approach to assess the disaster is very important for the mitigation program. The

condition of the environment and the community control the impact and the policy for themitigation. Through some cases shown below, it can be seen that the disaster is more sensible tothe role of the anthropogenic factors.


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The environmental issues, such as: deforestation; water pollution from industrial wastes, sewage;air pollution in urban areas; smoke and haze from forest fires can be asses with the vulnerabilityanalysis. Together with the drought, flood and landslide, with an increment of the tendency and

probability of hazard as the alternation of the land use is intensified, the assessment through thevulnerability will lead to a better result which can be used to quantify the risk later on.

Below there are some cases from different background for different disasters. We can see clearlyfrom the cases, how the influence of the mankind alter the situation, which at last inducing thedisaster.

1. Urbanization:Like many big cities in developing countries, Jakarta suffers from major urbanization problems.The population has risen sharply from 1.2 million in 1960 to 8.8 million in 2004 , counting onlyits legal residents. The population of greater Jakarta is estimated at 23 million, making it thefourth largest urban area in the world. Almost every year Jakarta experiences the same problem,especially on the month of February. For the whole month, the city especially the rural area iscovered by water, many times even above 1m. This event is repeated almost every year. Thoughthe precipitation is Jakarta is not the highest in Indonesia, it is the area most affected by theflood.Jakarta is built on the marsh. Due to the infrastructure demanding because of the urbanization,many marshes have been covered by the soil and houses are built above it. As a consequence, thedrainage basin area is decrease and most of the rainfall will turn to be run off rather thaninfiltrating to the soil. In such way, the susceptibility of the flood will increase.From the last event, February 2007, the OCHA recorded that at least 80 people died because of the flood and about 16,030 people remained displaced. There are no complete data of theeconomic losses. But it can be estimated from the impact caused by the disaster. The majority of all the suburb area was affected and many people lost their house. The direct losses can beestimated from the fact presented, e.g: the casualties, the infrastructures being destroyed, and thecost needed to rebuilt the facilities, etc. But the indirect losses sometimes are underestimated, butmany times are as high as or even higher than the direct losses.The susceptibility of the area is due to the internal factors (condition) of Jakarta, the geographicand geologic condition. But the hazards trigger by the precipitation as a result of human-inducedglobal warming, the increasing has led to higher monthly rainfall in Jakarta (BMG, Indonesia).With a higher precipitation and the decreasing in the rainfall recharge zone, the amount of rainfall flows as run-off will increase and in such way arising the probability of the hazard.The other human activities due to the urbanization are giving a negative impact to theenvironment. The increase of the demand of infrastructure, many times make people forget or neglect the framework on how the infrastructure should be constructed. The human-induced

alteration as:- cutting and filling the slope: can trigger the landslide and erosion.- building the infrastructure in the susceptible location: in the slope, near the volcano, etc.- changing the drainage system, thus alter the flow of the surface and subsurface water: trigger the flood and the landslide.- clearing the forest to construct a new infrastructure on it: this activity is one of the cause of thedeforestation that can lead to many hazards, including the way to clear the forest, many times thewildfire in the forest is not the natural event, but human-induced fire. And this kind of action putIndonesia as a smoke-exported country.

2. Deforestation:

The most affecting areas are Kalimantan, Irian and Sumatera. But its not strange that we almostgot no information for the logging in Irian since the socioeconomic impact is less than the other

place because the vulnerability and the element of risk is very low or even null. The living area is
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Urbanizationhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2004http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Urbanizationhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2004


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almost intact for there are very few population is that place. But the impact on the environment,as on the morphology, is as important as any other more populated area.One of the direct impacts can be seen in the event in 2003 in Sumatra. The disaster that occurredin North Sumatra has killed at least 83 people. The other event also happened in the Java(Terradaily, 2003) that caused more than 20 people got killed in that disaster.

The main triggering factor is the high intensity rainfall. But it was not the only factor responsiblein provoking the hazards. Many experts have said that the deforestation is the other factor.Indonesia has lost almost half of its forest due to the logging in the last decades. The decreasingof the forest is following by the increasing of the events of the disaster.The vegetation isThe direct losses of the 2003 disasters can be estimated from the losses due to the rainfalltriggering floods, erosions and landslides. The casualties were great and many of the peopleshouses were destroyed. The indirect impact was the loss of the tourism income. Since thelocation in the North Sumatra is near the tourism spot, many tourism activities had to becancelled in the area. The other indirect loss was the fund needed to mitigate the disaster and torebuild the infrastructure.


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(Source: United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA))


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(Source: World Resources Institute (WRI))


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5. Conclusion and Recommendation

http://www.bmg.go.id/

http://www.duyure.org/ : Working paper: Bakrim, H. Reassessment of Natural Disasters: LivingConditions and Peoples Vulnerability to Natural Disasters - Hurricane Mitch andTegucigalpa, Honduras.

http://earthtrends.wri.org/updates/node/147 : Drought in Indonesia Could Intensify with GlobalWarming.

http://earthtrends.wri.org/updates/node/225 : July 2007 Monthly Update: Vulnerability andAdaptation to Climate Change in Developing Countries.

http://www.globalforestwatch.org/english/indonesia/forests.htm

http://www.nature.com/climate/2007/0709/full/climate.2007.40.html : The futures wet

http://www.pelangi.or.id/media.php?mid=173 : Climate change has pushed up Jakarta rainfall:BMG

http://www.terradaily.com/2003/031104070229.gh2k27d4.html : Deadly Indonesia flood is latestdisaster linked to rampant illegal logging.

http://www.wri.org/biodiv/pubs_description.cfm?PubID=3147 : The state of the forest:Indonesia.

Adger, W. N. (1999). Social Vulnerability to Climate Change and Extremes in Coastal Vietnam.World Development, Vol. 27, No. 2, pp. 249-269, 1999. 1999 Elsevier Science Ltd.

Schuster, L.R. and Highland, L.M.U.S. Geological Survey, U.S.A (2001) Socioeconomics andEnvironmental Impacts of the Landslides in the Western Hemisphere, in Castaneda Martinez,

Jorge E., and Olarte Montero, Juan, eds., Proceedings of the Third Panamerican Symposiumon Landslides, July 29 to August 3, 2001, Cartagena Colombia, 886 p.

Schuster, R.L. and Highland, L.M. (2007). The Third Hans Cloos Lecture. Urban landslides:socioeconomic impacts and overview of mitigative strategies. Bull Eng Geol Environment(2007) 66:127
http://www.bmg.go.id/http://www.duyure.org/http://earthtrends.wri.org/updates/node/147http://earthtrends.wri.org/updates/node/225http://www.globalforestwatch.org/english/indonesia/forests.htmhttp://www.nature.com/climate/2007/0709/full/climate.2007.40.htmlhttp://www.pelangi.or.id/media.php?mid=173http://www.terradaily.com/2003/031104070229.gh2k27d4.htmlhttp://www.wri.org/biodiv/pubs_description.cfm?PubID=3147http://www.bmg.go.id/http://www.duyure.org/http://earthtrends.wri.org/updates/node/147http://earthtrends.wri.org/updates/node/225http://www.globalforestwatch.org/english/indonesia/forests.htmhttp://www.nature.com/climate/2007/0709/full/climate.2007.40.htmlhttp://www.pelangi.or.id/media.php?mid=173http://www.terradaily.com/2003/031104070229.gh2k27d4.htmlhttp://www.wri.org/biodiv/pubs_description.cfm?PubID=3147

Anthropogenic Factors in Controlling the Natural Hazards

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