Haiti – Dominican Republic - Disasters and Conflicts - UNEP

Flooding in cities and towns is a common occurrence throughout the island, often causing severe damageand deaths as a result of insufficient infrastructure to respond to high surface water flows.© UNEPhigh” risk to natural hazards, with Haiti ranking32 nd . 106 Although the Dominican Republic’s naturalhazard exposure is higher than that of Haiti, Haiti isranked as the 10 th most vulnerable state to naturalhazards having a higher vulnerability due to its highsusceptibility, and lack of coping and adaptivecapacities, rather than from the mere occurrenceof natural disasters. This means that Haiti cansignificantly reduce its natural hazard vulnerabilityby improving its public infrastructure, economiccapacity, governance, and public services.The key natural hazards for both countries are:• Hurricanes and associated major floods andlandslides.• Tropical storms and associated flash floods.• Earthquakes.• Droughts.Statistics show that a major disaster (such ascyclones, floods and droughts) affects Haiti every5-7 years and that internationally recognizeddisaster hits it every 2 years. Overall, between 1980and 2010 Haiti experienced 74 natural hazards(tropical storms, floods, landslides, epidemics andearthquakes). 107 Haiti’s is also the country with thehighest relative vulnerability to tropical cyclonesamongst the Small Island Developing States,followed by the Dominican Republic in secondplace, making Hispaniola the most susceptibleisland to hurricanes in the Caribbean. 108, 109 In 2008,for example, four hurricanes affected nine of Haiti’sten departments within one month, impactingan estimated 8 percent of its population (about800,000 people) and causing major damages inall sectors. 110Disaster data from the Dominican Republicindicates 40 natural hazard events for the period1980 to 2008, which affected 2.65 million peoplewith total economic damages estimated atUS$2.56 billion. Tropical storms and floods havehad the greatest impact in the country, causingrespectively US$2.51 billion and US$44.2 milliondollars damages. 111 The number of people killedis estimated at 1,446, 42% of whom were killed bystorms, 55% by floods and the remaining 3% byepidemics. 112Haiti – Dominican Republic: Environmental challenges in the border zone27