Knowledge Base highlights and editors' picks

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Every week the PreventionWeb team of editors selects the latest news and research, reports and publications on disaster risk reduction – here is their selection of the latest must-read content.

Update

11 January 2023

New report shows alarming changes in the entire global water cycle

In 2022, a third La Niña year brought much rain to Australia and Southeast Asia and dry conditions to the other side of the Pacific. These patterns were expected, but behind these variations there are troubling signs the global water cycle is changing.

Conversation Media Group, the

A farmer planting on the organic paddy rice farmland

Research briefs

16 January 2023

Genetically modified rice could be key to tackling food shortages caused by climate change

As sea levels rise as a result of climate change, more and more places around the world are struggling with seawater inundation—where salt water from the sea is flooding further inland and destroying crops which can't cope with the increased salinity.

University of Sheffield

A resident walks past a collapsed house in the aftermath of the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake

Research briefs

11 January 2023

A more realistic earthquake probability model using long-term fault memory

Results of a new study by Northwestern University researchers will help earthquake scientists better deal with seismology's most important problem: when to expect the next big earthquake on a fault.

Physics World

Northwestern University

Update

11 January 2023

What does climate change mean for extreme waves? In 80% of the world, we don’t really know

Across much of the world’s oceans, waves are getting bigger. In the Southern Ocean, where storm-driven swell can propagate halfway across the world to California, the average wave has grown about 20cm in the past 30 years.

Conversation Media Group, the

Olive trees burn during a wildfire in Greece

Update

12 January 2023

Past eight years confirmed to be the eight warmest on record

The past eight years were the warmest on record globally, fueled by ever-rising greenhouse gas concentrations and accumulated heat, according to six leading international temperature datasets consolidated by the World Meteorological Organization.

World Meteorological Organization (WMO)

A lone house surrounded by floodwaters in Brisbane, Australia

Update

12 January 2023

Flooding in California: What went wrong, and what comes next

Battered by storm after storm, California is facing intense flooding, with at least 19 lives lost so far and nearly 100,000 people evacuated from their homes. And there’s no sign that the storms will be letting up soon.

Columbia Climate School

Update

6 January 2023

How can climate policy better address climate-driven population displacement?

Catherine Higham and Arnaud Koehl analyse the existing policy responses to climate migration worldwide, identifying a clear division in scope and ambition between wealthy and poorer countries.

London School of Economics and Political Science, the

Volunteers support reconstruction work in Macrohon after typhoon Rai

Update

11 January 2023

Ιn Iloilo City, Philippines, an inclusive housing program protects vulnerable communities from flood risks

Iloilo City’s Participatory Housing and Urban Development project demonstrates that it is possible to build resilient cities and homes while improving the quality-of-life for the urban poor.

World Resources Institute

Update

11 January 2023

Preparedness efforts for health threats: the gap between detection and action

The World Health Organisation (WHO) was highly criticised for its delay in declaring Covid-19 as a public health emergency of international concern via social media and a public investigation.

National Preparedness Commission

Damaged bridge after the floods in the Ahr valley in Germany in 2021.

Update

11 January 2023

Atmospheric rivers over California’s wildfire burn scars raise fears of deadly mudslides – this is what cascading climate disasters look like

Rivers of muddy water from heavy rainfall raced through city streets as thousands of people evacuated homes downhill from California’s wildfire burn scars amid atmospheric river storms drenching the state in early January 2023.

Conversation Media Group, the