The financial damage due to Superstorm Sandy – which devastated parts of Haiti and Cuba before hitting the east coast of the United States – is still being computed. A new study conducted by the think tank Germanwatch has now found that developing countries in Asia suffered the maximum loss and damage due to storms in 2011.
The think tank, which has been publishing a Global Climate Risk index for a few years now, found that Thailand, Cambodia, Pakistan and El Salvador were had suffered most from extreme weather events in 2011. In Thailand, exceptionally heavy rains killed an estimated 900 people and caused damages of more than $75 billion.
Launching the latest edition of the index, Sven Harmeling, team leader in charge of international climate policy at Germanwatch, said, “Losses and damages from extreme weather events are the reality today in particular in developing countries. The findings of the Germanwatch Climate Risk Index underline this fact. Recent science results also tell us that climate change is an increasing factor in the occurrence of very heavy events.”
The Germanwatch long-term ranking from 1992 to 2011 lists Honduras, Myanmar and Nicaragua as the worst affected countries in terms of fatalities and losses.