122. The Water Sector and the Natural Disasters– Can Natural Disasters Prevent Development?

There are two ways in which water related disasters could prevent development. The most obvious is when disasters produce live losses and destroy properties and goods, and thus pose serious threats to socio-eco-nomic development. The paper focuses in the less obvious situation in which to prevent losses that could be produced by natural disasters, measures are taken in which the potential of flood plains, and the overall balance of investments, benefits and losses is not considered for a particular flood management strategy. This perverse impact that could have certain policies has an alternative. If Integrated Flood Management (IFM) is applied, which also takes into account the advantages of settling in flood plains and using floodwaters, then development is not prevented.