Vulnerable groups

Although everyone is vulnerable to environmental impacts of some kind, the ability of people and societies to adapt to and cope with change is very varied. Developing countries, particularly the least developed, have less capacity to adapt to change and are more vulnerable to environmental threats and global change, just as they are more vulnerable to other stresses. This condition is most extreme among the poorest people (IPCC 2001) and disadvantaged groups such as women and children.

The coping capacity of human society is a combination of all the natural and social characteristics and resources available in a particular location that are used to reduce the impacts of hazards (IATFDR 2001). These include factors such as wealth, technology, education, information, skills, infrastructure, access to resources and management capabilities. Between two and three times as many disaster events were reported in the United States in 1999 as in India or Bangladesh but there were 14 times and 34 times more deaths in India and in Bangladesh, respectively, than in the United States (UNEP 2000). The critical factor behind these statistics lies in the advantages enjoyed by US citizens in terms of levels of coping capacity (see also Chapter 2, 'Disasters'). There is, therefore, no direct correlation between the occurrence of extreme events and their level of human impact.

In many instances, coping capacity that was adequate in the past has not kept pace with environmental change. This can happen when traditional options are reduced or eliminated (the settlement of nomads, the introduction of regulations restricting resource use that was previously free), or when new threats emerge for which no coping mechanism exists, resources are lacking, and technology and skills are not available.

Some groups are more exposed than others to particular environmental risks: urban populations are exposed to high levels of contaminant and particulate pollution in the air, slum dwellers often lack the minimum protective infrastructure, employees may be exposed to particular hazards in the work place, and the uninformed may simply not know about the threats that surround them. A wide range of social and economic factors have direct and indirect bearing on human vulnerability to environmental change, including poverty and inequality, and the availability of natural resources. No standard framework exists for identifying all these factors.

Poverty is generally recognized as one of the most important causes of vulnerability to environmental threats, on the basis that the poor tend to have much lower coping capacities, and thus they bear a disproportionate burden of the impact of disasters, conflict, drought, desertification and pollution. But poverty is not the only reason. The very young and the old, women and children are often identified as especially vulnerable groups. Refugees, migrants and other displaced groups lack both the physical resources and social structure necessary to respond to threats although paradoxically they may initially benefit from the high visibility of their plight. The urban poor, on the other hand, usually live in obscurity, and in times of disaster their numbers can swell enormously. The mosaics of vulnerability seem so complex as to cast doubt on attempts to describe patterns and estimate trends at the global or even the regional scale. General or gradual economic decline can affect vulnerable groups disproportionately, creating severe but largely hidden hardships (Downing and Bakker 2000).

The cultural dimension is important. Indigenous communities with unique lifestyles intimately adapted to local climate, vegetation and wildlife may be particularly threatened by environmental change (see box below). Traditionally, many indigenous communities developed highly specific coping mechanisms to deal with their environments and periodic extreme events. Such coping mechanisms included adaptive behaviour such as regular seasonal migration or exceptional relocation in times of flooding or drought, and changes in practices such as planting and gathering specific food crops; for example, fruits and foods that are not usually eaten during times of good harvests may be relied upon in times of crop failure. With the breakdown of social patterns, and reduction of options to continue following indigenous lifestyles, such coping mechanisms are also giving way or disappearing.

Poor and indigenous communities are considered to be more vulnerable to climate-related events such as storms, floods and droughts because of inadequacies in social support services and systems such as water management infrastructure (IPCC 2001). They are also more affected by pests and diseases - especially vector-borne, respiratory and other infectious diseases (Woodward and others 1998, Braaf 1999). In addition, since many poor inhabit isolated rural environments or the margins of large towns and cities, they are more exposed to social problems associated with economic insecurity, inadequate water supplies and lower health standards.