International conference on the demography of disasters: Implications for future policy on development and resilience

By exploring how mortality caused by natural disasters impacts on women, men, children, the elderly and people with disabilities, the conference aims:

• To contribute to more cost-effective government policies on disaster mitigation, preparedness and recovery for vulnerable populations;
• To make the latest cultural and cross-cultural research on disaster mitigation, preparedness and recovery available to representatives from disaster impacted countries with a view to this material being incorporated in public policy;
• To enable disaster risk reduction practitioners among civil society groups who have daily operational interaction with disaster-impacted communities to come together to share their knowledge and experience with a view to opening dialogue on improved approaches to development and resilience among vulnerable, often poverty-stricken, populations;
• To explore how access to social capital in family and kinship networks, land and assets influence survival rates and adaptive behaviors after a disaster; and
• To examine the impact of migration into and out of disaster-affected areas and what are the long-term socio-economic impacts of these migration flows on individuals and population groups.

Speakers:

• Professor Elizabeth Frankenberg, Duke University, North Carolina
• Professor Susan Cutter, University of South Carolina
• Professor Mark Pelling, King's College, London
• Professor Douglas Paton, University of Tasmania
• Professor Josifina Natividad, University of The Philippines
• Professor Yang Chenggang, Population Research Institute, Chengdu, China
• Professor Ken Miichi, Iwate Prefectural University, Japan.