Rising flood waters continue to exact a heavy toll

Last September, late monsoon rains burst the banks of rivers in northern India and Pakistan, killing hundreds of people and displacing and terrifying millions more.

The tragedy - which left thousands of refugees hunting for food and clean water after their homes were destroyed - was the worst natural disaster in the world last year, according to analysis by the World Resources Institute, a think-tank.

It took India to the top of a 164-strong ranking of the countries most affected by river flooding worldwide in 2014, followed by Bangladesh, China and Vietnam.

The risk of flooding extends to developed nations such as the US and the UK and is expected to get worse, says the WRI. It expects numbers affected by floods to more than double from about 21m people now to 54m in 2030.

There are two main reasons behind the increase in flooding. The first is the growing trend towards urbanisation, with more people building and living on flood plains as cities expand. This exacerbated the flooding on both sides of the Indian and Pakistani borders last year. The second is climate change, which is causing rising sea levels, greater intensity of rainfall and more extremes in weather.

Both factors suggest that most flood-related disasters involve a natural event combined with economic and political failures.

Charles Iceland, director at the WRI, estimates that almost $100bn of GDP globally is exposed to river flood damage each year and that this will grow fivefold by 2030.

The effect on business can be disastrous. For example the 2011 floods in Thailand disrupted supply chains for Toyota, the carmaker, and Western Digital, the computer hard disk manufacturer.

Floods are the worst natural catastrophe, taking more lives each year than tornadoes, tsunamis or earthquakes, Mr Iceland says. "People have their heads stuck in the sand. They either don't want to put the resources in or don't have the money to put the resources in."

The WRI found that the top 15 countries in the ranking account for nearly 80 per cent of the population affected every year. The US is the worst hit high-income country, with some 167,000 people affected by flooding annually.

Bryan Harvey, water business group director, at CH2M Hill, the engineering consultancy, says one problem is that governments are not planning for the long term.

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This was emphasised in Britain where the devastating floods in the winter of 2013-14 led to ministers partially reversing cuts to flood defence spending with emergency grants. Despite this, a report by the UK's National Audit Office last November found funding to flood defences has fallen by 10 per cent since 2010.

Jim Hall, professor of climate and environmental risks and director of the Environmental Change Institute at the University of Oxford, agrees that countries are still reacting to extreme events rather than planning for them. "When storms strike, that tends to trigger policy reaction," he says.

After Hurricane Sandy hit New York in 2012 - the worst storm in 100 years - the federal government awarded around $20bn in aid to the city. This included approximately $335m to build the first stage of "the Big U" - a large storm protection barrier around lower Manhattan that will extend for 10 miles and aims to shield the city from floods and storm water. However, it is unclear who pays for the rest of the project.

Approximately 400,000 people live on New York's floodplain and while this is only 5 per cent of the city's population, it represents a greater proportion and density than any other city in the US.

"No one was really surprised when Hurricane Sandy did so much damage," says Prof Hall. "For a city of this level of economic activity, the level of flood protection was absurdly low."

He points to Vancouver as an example of a city preparing in advance for rising water, even though it has yet to suffer from extreme weather. The city is vulnerable to rising sea levels and densely populated parts of Vancouver are either coastal or situated at the mouth of the Fraser river - which is susceptible to heavy rainfall and melting snowfall, which could cause flooding.

<>Vancouver has raised the minimum construction elevation for new buildings by 1.1m, updated flood maps, planted trees and restored old creeks to provide additional storm water storage.

But it is still some way behind the Netherlands. Flood protection in the country has always been a national security issue, because much of the nation is below sea level, which is expected to rise over the next decade.

In Rotterdam, measures include building larger dykes and installing water plazas to hold storm water.

Overall, Prof Hall says that Asia remains the continent most vulnerable to severe flood damage and is set to become much worse.

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