There's No Such Thing As a Natural Disaster: Droughts and Famines

This post is a response to the following website: Humanitarian Early Warning Service – Drought and Food Security.

Droughts and famines are not natural disasters. They appear that way to us because they appear after an environmental stimulus - like a sustained drop in rainfall or a parasite – makes water and crops unavailable to some group. However, it is not the natural factor that causes the drought and famine. What causes the actual human suffering is the failure of society to adjust and manage that natural event. The main reason for failure to adjust is political. Amartya Sen, a nobel prize winning economist, was famous for demonstrating that famines do not happen because of lack of food supplies, but because of failures in distribution. That was why he was able to show that famines do not occur in democracies because democratic governments must be responsive to the needs of their population. Political factors are complex, and not always so straightforward as democracy v. dictatorship. Famines in Ethiopia and Somalia in the 1980s and 1990s were due to the mixture of civil war and humanitarian food aid. (The food aid drove farmers off the land, who couldn’t or wouldn’t compete with the free food, and Somali warlords were able to seize the food, strengthening their position and prolonging the war.)

However, one thing that is clear is that it is easier for a society to respond to its population’s needs if it has an ample surplus, and if it has the kinds of technology that assist in its response – good roads, cheap fuel, communications systems.

Regular readers know where I’m going with this. The way in which natural disasters are linked to climate change seems to me substantially backwards for two reasons. First, a common argument is that natural disasters like droughts and famines will increase because of changes in the weather (shifting, reduced rainfalls, temperature changes, etc…) Second, the response is mainly to see in industrialization a problem. The problem is fundamental enough that the priorities of development should be changed: the main objective in industrial development should be reducing greenhouse gas emissions rather than in generating cheaper resources. However, if the first is false then so is the second. If the main cause of natural disasters is social, and one important factor in society’s ability to respond is the amount and quality of technology it has to manage the disaster, then the priority really should be rapid industrialization of those areas that lack adequate resources. Industrialization will not solve all problems, especially not problems having to do with democracy and representation, but it is a powerful aid.

To substantiate my point, consider the map from the website mentioned above. Almost every country experiencing a “food emergency” or “unfavorable prospects” is in Africa, besides Colombia, Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan and Mongolia. Of that latter five, the first three are in a civil war/destroyed by invasion, and the fourth has been severely disrupted by a number of factors. While Africa experiences some distinct weather conditions, they are not so substantially different that the weather explains why it has such profoundly worse food prospects. Consider this quote from the country analysis of Kenya: “rains disrupted any potential improvements in food security by displacing households and destroying lives, livelihoods, and infrastructure…While the majority of pastoralists have migrated back to normal wet-season grazing areas, a proportion were displaced and had to move away from flooded areas…In coastal areas where floods damaged the early planted crop, particularly in Kwale and Kilifi districts, maize has only just passed the post-germination stage. Rates of malnutrition remain high in most pastoral districts...”

Rains do not have to disrupt food security, displace individuals, and force widespread migration. They do that only because Kenya lacks adequate technology to control the rains, build houses that can withstand environmental stresses, and protect farms; and because its political situation means that some groups are not politically represented and therefore left to their own devices. If we start thinking about these situations as social, not natural disasters, then the natural conclusions we draw are that the main objectives should be industrial development and political equality, not sustainable development.