Search results

This paper aims to provide a general overview of the international Tsunami warning system mandated by the United Nations, particularly on cataloging past studies and a strategic focus in the Indian Ocean, particularly on the Bay of Bengal region.

Present research assimilates the secondary non-classified data on the Tsunami warning system installed in the Indian Ocean. Qualitative review and exploratory research methodology have been followed to provide a holistic profile of the Tsunami rarly warning system (TEWS) and its role in coastal resilience.

The study finds the need for strategic focus to expand and interlink regional early warning cooperation mechanisms and partnerships to enhance capacities through cooperation and international assistance and mobilize resources necessary to maintain the TEWS in the Indian Ocean region. The enhanced capacity of the TEWS certainly improves the resilience of Indian Ocean coastal communities and infrastructures.

The study is original research and useful for policy planning and regional cooperation on data interlinkages for effective TEWS in the Indian Ocean region.

The lessons learned from the 2004 tsunami phenomenon fueled the government and other local authorities to strengthen the legitimate background to mitigate such devastation in future events. This study aims to propose a standardized tsunami-resilient construction guideline for Sri Lanka by integrating existing local and international standards.

A comprehensive literature survey was carried out to undertake the study, with a wide-ranging content and thematic analysis of existing tsunami-resilient construction aspects in Sri Lanka. Integrating all existing guidelines with international standards, finally, a consolidated guideline with significant tsunami-resilient building aspects was proposed for stakeholders involved with the resilient built environment in tsunami-prone areas, particularly during the building construction in the coastal belt.

The existing tsunami-resilient guidelines in Sri Lanka follow similar aspects but in different dimensions. Compared to the international standards, few significant aspects create a gap in local guidelines. Thus, the findings demonstrated that the existing local guidelines must be modified and strengthened by mainstreaming into international practices.

Existing guidelines are more concerned with structural aspects. Nevertheless, proper integration of local and international guidelines would be more favorable to minimizing existing local guidelines’ gaps. Further, a standardized tsunami-resilient building guideline would be a referring document for all stakeholders in tsunami-resilient constructions.

By aligning local guidelines with international standards, the reliability of the guidelines will be increased and direct the built environment to quality disaster-resilient constructions.

Through a standardized guideline, the community can rely on tsunami-resilient construction in coastal cities.

The consolidated guideline further contains the essentials of city resilience in tsunamis and would be an excellent reference for relevant stakeholders than aligning with several guidelines.

The occurrences of disasters have become a common phenomenon in the world and there is evidence that the frequency and intensity of disasters are increasing. There have been more than 7,000 disaster events and around 265 million displacements in the period from 2008 to 2018, which constitutes more than three times of conflict and violence-related displacements (Disaster Displacement – A global review, 2019). Natural disasters are responsible for nearly 60,000 deaths per year on average and are responsible for 0.1% of global deaths. Various forms of natural disasters pose significant threats to lives, livelihoods, economic development, and ecological diversity around the world. Similar to the world scenario, Sri Lanka has a similar situation. Sri Lanka has been identified as a drought hot spot. Nearly, 15,000 people per million are at risk of disaster-induced displacement every year in Sri Lanka. During the Tsunami, in 2004, 31,000 human lives were lost, and more than a million people were displaced. Thus, natural disasters cause a huge negative impact on society and the economy in Sri Lanka. In this context, the main objectives of this study are to overview the disasters and displacements that have occurred during the last two decades and to explore the livelihood activities of the affected people and their best practices of disaster resilience. Secondary data were used to overview the disasters and displacements of the last two decades and the related policy framework of the country. Primary data were used to identify livelihood activities and disaster-resilient strategies of the affected people. In-depth interviews were conducted with an unstructured questionnaire from 15 recovered families who have been affected by Tsunami and landslides that occurred in the country. The purposive sampling method was used to select families from the most disaster-affected areas. Descriptive methods were used to analyze the data. The study revealed five recovery strategies followed by displaced people from tsunamis and landslides. Those are continuing with the previous livelihood activities as much as possible, moving to different livelihood activities, moving to different areas to find better jobs, attaining external assistance, and self-management on household finance. Finally, policy guidelines for building resilience in communities that will help to enhance their capacity to cope and recover from vulnerability are proposed in improving their lives.

Each stage in disaster management faces different challenges concerning information gathering, sharing, interpretation and dissemination. However, a comprehensive understanding of different information and communication technology (ICT) systems utilised for humanitarian disaster management is limited. Therefore, the paper follows a systems thinking approach to examine ten major man-made and/or natural disasters to comprehend the influence of ICT systems on humanitarian relief operations.

A longitudinal, multi-case study captures the use of ICT tools, stakeholders involvement, disaster stages and zones of operations for relief operations over the past two decades. A systems thinking approach is utilised to draw several inferences and develop frameworks.

Multiple ICT tools such as geographic information systems, online webpages/search engines, social media, unmanned aerial vehicles/robots and artificial intelligence are used for rapid disaster response and mitigation. Speed and coordination of relief operations have significantly increased in recent years due to the increased use of ICT systems.

Secondary data on the past ten disasters is utilised to draw inferences. The developed ICT-driven model must be validated during upcoming humanitarian relief operations.

A holistic understanding of a complex inter-relationship between influential variables (stakeholders, disaster stages, zones of operation, ICT systems) is beneficial for effectively managing humanitarian disasters.

Broadly classifying the ICT systems into surveillance, decision support and broadcasting systems, a novel ICT-enabled model for humanitarian relief operations is developed.

This paper aims to examine and compare extant literature on the application of multi-criteria decision-making (MCDM) techniques in humanitarian operations (HOs) and humanitarian supply chains (HSCs). It identifies the status of existing research in the field and suggests a roadmap for academicians to undertake further research in HOs and HSCs using MCDM techniques.

The paper systematically reviews the research on MCDM applications in HO and HSC domains from 2011 to 2022, as the field gained traction post-2004 Indian Ocean Tsunami phenomena. In the first step, an exhaustive search for journal articles is conducted using 48 keyword searches. To ensure quality, only those articles published in journals featuring in the first quartile of the Scimago Journal Ranking were selected. A total of 103 peer-reviewed articles were selected for the review and then segregated into different categories for analysis.

The paper highlights insufficient high-quality research in HOs that utilizes MCDM methods. It proposes a roadmap for scholars to enhance the research outcomes by advocating adopting mixed methods. The analysis of various studies revealed a notable absence of contextual reference. A contextual mind map specific to HOs has been developed to assist future research endeavors. This resource can guide researchers in determining the appropriate contextual framework for their studies.

This paper will help practitioners understand the research carried out in the field. The aspiring researchers will identify the gap in the extant research and work on future research directions.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first literature review on applying MCDM in HOs and HSCs. It summarises the current status and proposes future research directions.

This study aims at investigating the evolution of disaster management by identifying the different phases it has gone through over time, and laying a ground for the next generation of disaster studies that focus on value-creating and value-adding activities.

An extensive review of the existing literature was made to develop an understanding of the evolution of disaster management. This study does not aim at assessing the tools or techniques used; rather it aims at identifying the major developments that took place over time.

Disaster management is a dynamic process. It has encountered/experienced different evolutionary phases that indicate that it has been developing over time. It continues to evolve until today as long as disasters occur. The nature and complexity of disasters are also changing. Most importantly, what seemed to be a practical approach for managing disasters yesterday might not fit for the use of today or tomorrow.

Understanding the evolution of disaster management mirrors the evolution of mankind and the ways people survived major incidents. As life itself evolves, disasters will continue to evolve which subsequently triggers the need for broader management insight to cope with.

This study traces the evolution of disaster management and the development of research and practice in this field over time. The existing literature rarely addresses the uniqueness of individual disasters and the need to treat them differently even the recurrent ones. To the best of the author’s knowledge, there is no single study that attempted to capture the evolution of disaster management during the 20th century until today. This study aims to achieve this goal.

This study aims to explore the perception among the tourism stakeholders about Halal tourism competitiveness, challenges and opportunities in Aceh, a Sharia-law tourism destination.

This study adopted the qualitative research method and used in-depth interviews with purposively selected 13 Halal tourism stakeholders in Aceh.

This study found that the Indonesian Government has aggressively promoted Aceh as one of its main Halal tourist destinations. Despite its popularity in the growing and lucrative Muslim market, the understanding of Halal tourism in Aceh among its stakeholders is still at its infancy level. Besides, although Aceh is a Muslim-majority region, its Halal facilities and services, especially the Halal certification for their foodservice industry, are still lacking compared to their neighbouring competitors.

This study confirms the scarcity of stakeholder understanding and support challenged and undermined Aceh’s Halal tourism competitiveness. As such, this study sheds light on the original insight that stakeholders’ limited comprehension and backing can hinder Aceh’s Halal tourism competitiveness.

This study aims to compare the humanitarian supply chains and logistics of two countries in earthquake preparedness by modifying and using a previously established preparedness evaluation framework.

A European flood emergency management system (FEMS) is a seven-dimensional framework to assess a country’s preparedness for flood emergencies. The FEMS framework was modified to apply to earthquakes. Leveraging a multiple explanatory case study approach with data analysis, the authors reconstructed the events of the earthquakes in Pakistan (2005) and Japan (2011) with an applied grading (1–5). Findings were evaluated within the adopted FEMS framework. From a practitioner’s perspective, the framework is applicable and can accelerate support in the field.

Pakistan lacked emergency plans before the 2005 earthquake. In contrast, Japan possessed emergency plans before the disaster, helping minimise casualties. Overall, Japan demonstrated considerably better emergency management effectiveness. However, both countries significantly lacked the distribution of responsibilities among actors.

Practical factors in the humanitarian supply chain are well understood. However, synthesising individual factors into a comprehensive framework is difficult, which the study solves by applying and adopting the FEMS framework to earthquakes. The developed framework allows practitioners a structured baseline for prioritising measures in the field. Furthermore, this study exemplifies the usefulness of cross-hazard research within emergency management and preparedness in a real-world scenario.

The Rajapaksa regime over the 2005–2022 period promoted a national-popular project based on a militarised Sinhala-Buddhist nationalism promoting a market-driven rentier economy. It illustrated a form of patrimonial capitalism undermining public accountability and the efficacy of the state bureaucracy. This popular-national project was dependent on strengthening ties with China while distancing relations with India and the Global North (USA and the EU). The ways in which the external relations were coordinated reinforced discrimination against Tamil and Muslim communities, while disregarding their demands for justice and reparations. The increasing integration of the economy with financial markets, driven by the Central Bank, amplified the commercialisation of the state, restraining public revenues and state oversight. Meanwhile, the militarisation of the state involved the commercialisation of the military, opaque military budgets and violent repression of protests. The Rajapaksa regime, which enabled a minority-privileged (leisure) class to culturally flourish in regulated safe spaces, also instigated multiple protests from below demanding democracy as well as justice.