COLLEGE OF ST.

JOHN – ROXAS LEARNING MODULE

Member: Association of LASSSAI- Accredited Superschools (ALAS)
Atila Balgos St. Banica, Roxas City

Grade Level/ Strand: ___________ Learning Area: __________________________ Inclusive Dates:

____________ Quarter/ Semester: ___________ Topic:
__________________________________________________________

Learning Competency:

At the end of the lesson, learners are expected to:

1. Explain the meaning of vulnerability; DRR11/12-Ic-8
2. Explain why certain sectors of society are more vulnerable to disaster than others;
DRR11/12-Ic-9
3. Recognize vulnerabilities of different elements exposed to specific hazards
DRR11/12-Id-12
4. Differentiate among hazards, exposure, and vulnerabilities and explain the relationship of
the three to disaster risk
DRR11/12-Id-13

Exposure and Vulnerability (Week 3-4)

Learning Objectives:

At the end of the lesson, learners should be able to:

• explain the meaning of vulnerability, capacity and resilience within the context of disaster
risk;
• distinguish between physical, social, economic and environmental factors that affect
vulnerability of exposed elements and give examples.
• explain the challenges a person with disability faces when coping with hazards;
• explain the connection between physical disability and social vulnerability to hazards;
• discuss strategies of helping persons with disabilities
• apply concepts of exposure and vulnerability previously learned in recognizing
vulnerability of different elements exposed to specific hazards;
• analyze how the reducing the vulnerability of an exposed element to a specific hazard
may result in increasing its vulnerability to other hazards and
• synthesize practical strategies for reducing collective vulnerability of elements exposed to
multiple hazards.
• given a particular situation, differentiate between hazards, exposed elements and their
vulnerabilities;
• give examples of hazard, exposed elements and their vulnerabilities from historical
events within the Philippines; and
• suggests mitigation, adaptation and preparedness strategies for managing disaster risk
Motivational Activity:

Inquiry

1. “What would happen if a very strong typhoon passes through a highly populated city”. You can follow
up with a historical example like “such as in case of Typhoon Yolanda when it passed through the city of
Tacloban? Why?”

2. Follow up the discussion with the following question: “What if instead, the strong typhoon passed
through an uninhabited island without people, would this still result in a disaster? Why? Why not?”

Note: (Kindly answer these questions in the Activity Worksheets)

Term Definition

(based on IUGS, 1997; UN-ISDR, 2004).

Natural hazard

A potentially damaging physical event, phenomenon or human activity that may cause the loss of life or
injury, property damage, social and economic disruption or environmental degradation. This event has a
probability of occurrence within a specified period of time and within a given area, and has a given
intensity.

Elements-at-risk

Population, properties, economic activities, including public services, or any other defined values
exposed to hazards in a given area”. Also referred to as “assets”. The amount of elements at risk can be
quantified either in numbers (of buildings, people etc), in monetary value (replacement costs, market
costs etc), area or perception (importance of elements-at-risk).

Exposure

Exposure indicates the degree to which the elements at risk are exposed to a particular hazard. The
spatial interaction between the elements at risk and the hazard footprints are depicted in a GIS by
simple map overlaying of the hazard map with the elements at risk map.

Vulnerability

The conditions determined by physical, social, economic and environmental factors or processes, which
increase the susceptibility of a community to the impact of hazards. Can be subdivided in physical,
social, economical, and environmental vulnerability.

Capacity

The positive managerial capabilities of individuals, households and communities to confront the threat
of disasters (e.g. through awareness raising, early warning and preparedness planning).

Consequence

The expected losses in a given area as a result of a given hazard scenario.

Risk

The probability of harmful consequences, or expected losses (deaths, injuries, property, livelihoods,
economic activity disrupted or environment damaged) resulting from interactions between (natural,
human-induced or man-made) hazards and vulnerable conditions in a given area and time period.

Lecture Notes/Discussion:
The UNISDR defines exposure as people, property, systems and other elements present in hazard zones
that are thereby subject to potential loss. (UNISDR, 2009) The term susceptibility is often used to
indicate that an element is exposed to a hazard.

The definition of exposure has three (3) essential components: I. People, property, systems and other
elements. Exposure involves specific elements which we must be able to identify and give a name to.
Elements may be tangible or intangible. II. Present in hazard zones. Elements should be located within
an area and duration of time during which a specific hazard event or set of hazard events can occur. III.
That are thereby subject to potential loss. Elements should have value or importance assigned to them
for it to be subject to potential loss.
UN-ISDR defines risk in short as “the probability of losses”. Risk can presented conceptually with the
following basic equation:

Risk = Hazard * Vulnerability * Amount of elements-at-risk (Equation 1)

and the more conceptual equation,

Risk = Hazard * Vulnerability / Capacity (Equation 2)

Figure 1.12: Basic function of risk, which can be divided into the components of hazard, the
vulnerability, and the amount of elements at risk that are exposed to the hazard.

As illustrated in Figure 1.12 there are two important components, which also should be spatially
represented: hazards and elements at risk. They are characterized by both spatial and non-spatial
attributes.

Hazards are characterized by their temporal probability and magnitude or intensity derived from
frequency magnitude analysis. In this respect magnitude and intensity can be considered as synonymous
terms that express the severity of the hazard. For instance, flood depth, flow velocity, and duration in
the case of flooding. For earthquakes the terms magnitude and intensity do have a different meaning,
with magnitude expressing the energy level of the earthquake (on the Richter scale) and intensity
expressing the local effects of the earthquake, that vary over a distance, becoming less further from the
epicenter (and expressed in qualitative classes such as the Modified Mercalli Intensity). The hazard
component in equation [1] actually refers to the probability of occurrence of a hazardous phenomenon
with a given intensity within a specified period of time (e.g. annual probability). Hazards also have an
important spatial component, both related to the initiation of the hazard (e.g. a volcano) and the
spreading of the hazardous phenomena (e.g. the areas affected by volcanic products such as lava flows).
Elements at risk are the population, properties, economic activities, including public services, or any
other defined values exposed to hazards in a given area. They are also referred to as “assets”. Elements
at risk also have spatial and non-spatial characteristics. First of all there are many different types of
elements at risk they can be classified in various ways. The way in which the amount of elements-at-risk
are characterized (e.g. as number of buildings, number of people, economic value or the area of
qualitative classes of importance) also defines the way in which the risk is presented. The interaction of
elements at risk and hazard defines the exposure and the vulnerability of the elements-at-risk . Exposure
indicates the degree to which the elements at risk are exposed to a particular hazard. The spatial
interaction between the elements at risk and the hazard footprints are depicted in a GIS by simple map
overlaying of the hazard map with the elements at risk map.

Vulnerability refers to the conditions determined by physical, social, economic and environmental
factors or processes, which increase the susceptibility of a community to the impact of hazards.
Vulnerability can be subdivided in physical, social, economic, and environmental vulnerability. The
vulnerability of communities and households can be based on a number of criteria, such as age, gender,
source of income etc. which are analyzed using equation [2]. However, according to equation [1]
vulnerability is evaluated as the interaction between the intensity of the hazard and the type of
element-at-risk, making use of so-called vulnerability curves. The spatial interaction between elements-
at-risk and hazard footprints, which is often referred to as “exposure” in other risk formulas, is an
integral component of GIS-based risk assessment, and therefore the term exposure is not used as such
in the risk equation. When we calculate the risk equation using a Geographic Information System (GIS)
the elements

Defining vulnerability. Multiple definitions and different conceptual frameworks of vulnerability exist,
because several distinct groups have different views on vulnerability. Academic staff from different
disciplines, Disaster management agencies, development corporations, climatic change organization etc.
An overview is given on the website of the ProVention Consortium (http://www.proventionconsorti
um.org/) and in the book on Vulnerability edited by Birkmann (2006). Birkmann writes about the
paradox of aiming to measure vulnerability if we cannot yet define vulnerability precisely. Some of the
definitions are given in the box below. The first definition is still related only to physical vulnerability
while in the other definitions we find that vulnerability is influenced by several factors, mostly
mentioned are physical, economic, social and environmental factors. The definitions of vulnerability of
Provention and Blaikie clearly show that besides vulnerability the elements at risk also have capacities.
According to the UN, in their report Living with Risk (UN/ISDR, 2004), risk is rooted in conditions of
physical, social, economic and environmental vulnerability that need to be assessed and managed on a
continuing basis.

General definitions of vulnerability:

Vulnerability is:

 “The degree of loss to a given element at risk or set of elements at risk resulting from the
occurrence of a natural phenomenon of a given magnitude and expressed on a scale from 0 (no
damage) to 1 (total damage)” (UNDRO, 1991)
 “Exposure to risk and an inability to avoid or absorb potential harm (Pelling, 2003). In this
context, he defines physical vulnerability as the vulnerability of the physical environment; social
vulnerability as experienced by people and their social, economic, and political systems; and
human vulnerability as the combination of physical and social vulnerability” (in Vilagrán de León,
2006)

 “The characteristics of a person or group in terms of their capacity to anticipate, cope with,
resist and recover from impacts of a hazard” (Blaikie, Cannon et al. 1994).

 “The degree of susceptibility and resilience of the community and environment to hazards”
(EMA, 1995).

 “A human condition or process resulting from physical, social, economic and environmental
factors, which determine the likelihood and scale of damage from the impact of a given hazard”
(UNDP, 2004).

Vulnerability is:

 “The conditions determined by physical, social, economic and environmental factors or

processes, which increase the susceptibility of a community to the impact of hazards “(UNISDR)

 “The intrinsic and dynamic feature of an element at risk that determines the expected
damage/harm resulting from a given hazardous event and is often even affected by the harmful
event itself. Vulnerability changes continuously over time and is driven by physical, social,
economic and environmental factors” (UNU-EHS, 2006 )

 “The potential to suffer harm or loss, related to the capacity to anticipate a hazard, cope with it,
resist it and recover from its impact. Both vulnerability and its antithesis, resilience, are
determined by physical, environmental, social, economic, political, cultural and institutional
factors” (Provention Consortium, 2007)

 “The degree to which a system is susceptible to, or unable to cope with adverse effects of
climate change, including climate variability and extremes”. Vulnerability is a function of the
character, magnitude, and rate of climate variation to which the system is exposed, its
sensitivity, and its adaptive capacity” (IPCC,2001:165).

 Vulnerability = (Exposure ) + (Resistance ) + Resilience

With: Exposure: at risk property and population;

Resistance: Measures taken to prevent, avoid or reduce loss;

Resilience: Ability to recover prior state or achieve desired post-disaster state.

What is common from the definitions is that vulnerability is: - Multi-dimensional (e.g. physical,
social, economic, environmental, institutional, and human factors define vulnerability); -
Dynamic (vulnerability changes over time); - Scale-dependent (vulnerability can be expressed at
different scales from human to household to community to country resolution; - Site-specific
(each location might need its own approach). Below a number of vulnerability types are defined,
based also on figure 5.2. These definitions will be used as the working definitions within this
chapter and book. In the RiskCity exercises we will concentrate mostly on physical vulnerability
and to a lesser extent also on social vulnerability

General classification of elements at risk

There are many different types of elements at risk, and also many different ways to classify
them.

Table 4.1: Classification of elements at risk

Physical elements Buildings: Urban land use, construction types,

building height, building age, total floor space,
replacement costs. Monuments and cultural
heritage

Population Density of population, distribution in space,

distribution in time, age distribution, gender
distribution, handicapped, income distribution
Essential facilities Emergency shelters, Schools, Hospitals, Fire
Brigades, Police,
Socio-economic aspects Organization of population, governance,
community organization, government support,
socio-economic levels. Cultural heritage and
traditions.
Transportation facilities Roads, railway, metro, public transportation
systems, harbor facilities, airport facilities
Economic activities Spatial distribution of economic activities,
input-output table, dependency, redundancy,
unemployment, economic production in
various sectors.
Life lines Water supply, electricity supply, gas supply,
telecommunications, mobile telephone
network, sewage system.

Environmental elements Ecosystems, protected areas, natural parks,

environmentally sensitive areas, forests,
wetlands, aquifers, flora, fauna, biodiversity.

In literature many different methods can be found to classify elements at risk, depending on the
country, the setting (urban, rural, etc.) the objectives of the risk assessment, the scale, available
resources etc. For example, the Asian Disaster Preparedness Center (ADPC) classifies the
 elements at risk into physical, economic, societal and environmental elements (see table 4.2)
which can we linked later immediately to physical, economic, social and environmental
vulnerability.

Classification of elements at risk

Physical elements Societal elements

Infrastructure, for example: roads,
railway, bridges, harbors, airports etc.
Vulnerable age group categories Low-income
Critical facilities, for example: groups Landless/Homeless Disabled Gender
emergency shelters, schools, hospitals, Single parent households Etc.
nursing homes, fire brigades, police
etc...
Utilities: Power supply, Water supply
Services: transport, communications
etc... Government services: all levels -
national, provincial, local Machinery
and equipment Historical structures
and artifacts

Economic elements Environmental elements

Business and trade activities, Access to Environmental Resources: air, water, fauna,
work, Agricultural land, Impact on flora Biodiversity Landscape
work force, Productivity cost
Opportunity cost

Villagrán de Leon (2006), classifies the elements at risk according to different sectors: housing,
basic lifelines, health, education, agriculture, energy, infrastructure, commerce, industry,
finance and telecommunications. The sectoral approach is proposed from a policy point of view
because it promotes assigning responsibilities to those private or public institutions in charge of
each sector (Government ministries or others).

In literature many different methods can be found to classify elements at risk, depending on the
country, the setting (urban, rural, etc.) the objectives of the risk assessment, the scale, available
resources etc.

References:
Rimando, Rolly E., 2016. Disaster Readiness and Risk Reduction; Rex Bookstore. Manila, Philippines
Aurelio, M.A.,et.al.(2016). Teaching Guide for Senior High School Disaster Readiness and Risk Reduction: Commission on Higher Education.
Quezon City, Philippines.
https://www.preventionweb.net/files/28375_28294engkatastrofebiweb2.pdf
http://www.charim.net/methodology/52

https://vdocuments.site/mhra-guidebook-itc-2011.html