Occasionally, I receive ‘slips’ for books published in the field of ESM. This ‘slip’ pointed to a book published by the World Bank, and freely available on their website.
Amin, Samia and Markus Goldenstein, ed. Data against Natural Disasters: Establishing Effective Systems for Relief, Recovery, and Reconstruction. Washington, D.C.: The World Bank, 2008.
This volume, available online through the World Bank, has a two-fold purpose. In Part One, the case is made for the need to manage data before, during, and after a disaster. Part Two gives six Case Studies from around the world which illustrate cases in which data systems were used in an actual disaster. (Guatemala, Haiti, Indonesia, Mozambique, Pakistan and Sri Lanka are all highlighted; each instance occurred between 2004 and 2007.) With each study, the authors have highlighted some lessons learned, pointing the way forward in future disaster situations and supporting the arguments made in Part One. Packed with figures and tables, the ‘on-the-ground’ nature of the case studies makes the case for data very powerfully.
Be forewarned: this is a large .pdf file (1.96MB) crammed with informative and interesting insights. Be ready to spend time reading this!