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Risk management involves assessing and dealing with objective risks and therefore risk managers are expected to have reasonably advanced analytical knowledge and skills. However as noted earlier, many, if not most, of the elements within the uncertainty field do not provide much in the way of adequate data or information, and – even when they do – there can be significant problems with data quality. Thus, statistical or actuarial analysis tools are best used thoughtfully and mainly in the context of cases where an organisation has many similar exposures (a fleet of hundreds of vehicles, large numbers of employees) or when external data analysis fits convincingly with the more limited experience of the organisation itself. In any case, the overarching challenge for risk managers is to develop a consistent approach to thinking about all risks, uncertainties, emergent/unknown phenomena, even when they have very different characteristics.

Chapter Eleven adopts an approach that is somewhat different from Chapter One to Chapter Ten. Previously, a general, descriptive overview of the subject is given beforehand, and then a slightly different discussion is offered to provide an alternative commentary. Here, the alternative insights are woven into a discussion of decision-making. After presenting this different approach, the traditional decision-making tools are presented and discussed. Since Chapter Twelve also serves as a summary, a more integrated approach is used here.

Pakistan lies between latitudes 24° 37′ N and longitudes 62° 75′ E, covering a total land area of 796,096km². The country shares its borders with Iran to the west, India in the southeast, Afghanistan in the northwest, and China in the north. The Arabian Sea lies to its south (UNISDR, 2005; Khan, 2004d). The country has four provinces: the Punjab, the North West Frontier Province (NWFP), Sindh, Baluchistan, and two federally administrated territories – the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) and the Northern Areas. The Northern Areas have been recently given the status of Gilgit-Baltistan province. The structure of the provisional government is still in its formation stage. In addition, the territory of Azad Jammu and Kashmir (AJK) is under the administration of the government of Pakistan. Each province or territory is further divided into administrative units known as districts (GOP, 2003; Khan, 2004d).

Over the past decades, changes in climate have been commonly observed in many parts of the world. It is apparent that changes in temperature and rainfall and resulting increases in frequency and intensity of flood and drought events have affected ecological and social systems on the earth. According to the Fourth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, warming atmosphere of the climate system is now unequivocal (IPCC, 2007). Climate change poses significant risks to the livelihoods, culture, and health of millions of people (Barnett, 2003). Ecological and climatic disasters – hurricanes, tornadoes, draught, flooding, landslides – are becoming more frequent, resulting in devastation to family and communities, especially the poor living in precarious environments (Ogata & Sen, 2003). Related to this, the number of climate-led disaster events and affected populations has been increasing during the last decades according to the data from EM-DAT (2010).

The paper looks at local experience and concerns in environmental disasters in the upper Indus Basin, widely thought to become more serious due to climate change. Emphasis is on the lives and livelihoods, responses, and concerns of those most affected. Several events and their contexts are examined. They highlight socially distributed and differentiated risks, losses, adaptive capacities, and available or absent protections. Cases at the village level underline problems relating to aspects of women's work and health; and how, while traditional practices are being enforced to ensure their continued seclusion and subordination, the villages and men's work are increasingly drawn into the modern economy and modernizing developments. Often these trends undermine traditional risk-averse practices but fail to provide alternatives. Some larger disasters reveal a disconnect between research and official responses, and expose the needs of local communities, whether in villages or mountain towns. This study examines how exposure and vulnerability to environmental dangers are a social construct. It leads to an argument for the “professional ear” in these contexts, finding ways to listen to those rarely heard, and translations that respect their concerns. Such work looks at conditions essentially invisible to climate models, and differing in character and approach. Arguably, it should come ahead of attempts to use model results to propose adaptive responses in these contexts.

Our planet's essential goods and services emanate from the functions of biological diversity. An ecological sphere rich in variety and endowed with highly productive ecosystem services in which fishery resources are present provides attractive benefits. Fishery resource is the primary form of people's livelihood for survival, especially in coastal areas. It is a major source of food protein for human beings representing at least 15 percent of the average per capita animal protein intake of more than 2.9 billion people [Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), 2009]. Significant demands for fishery resources create employment opportunities for many people around the world (FAO, 1995). Indeed, the number of fishers, including aquaculturists, has grown faster than the world's population and faster than employment in traditional agriculture during the past three decades (FAO, 2007a, 2009). In 2004, an estimated 51 million people were making their entire or partial living from fish production and capture (Pomeroy & Rivera-Guieb, 2006), the great majority of these in Asian countries (FAO, 2007a, 2009). According to FAO (2009), it has been estimated that for each person employed in the fishery primary sector, there could be four employed in the secondary sector (including fish processing, marketing, and related service industries). The estimated total population employed in the entire fish industry is approximately 204 million people. The total amounts of fish landing, including aquaculture, have maintained an upward trend, as shown in Fig. 1.1. To a large extent, advanced fishing technology that is efficiently and effectively capable of catching or harvesting fishery resources attracted a large number of fishers and has contributed to an increase in fish landing quantity.