University Park ONLY: Formative Assessment 1: Coastal Community Profile

World-wide examples of communities facing challenges created by the coastal hazards

Objectives

• Use data from online sources to create profiles of two world-wide coastal communities in order to gain an understanding of the complexities of living with coastal hazards.
• Consider the particular challenges of countries with lower levels of GDP than, for example, the U.S., and countries with extremely high levels of coastal hazard exposure.

Overview

In this activity, you will use the World Bank Climate Knowledge Portal to access TWO COUNTRY PROFILES and summarize the information about the situations faced by the people living there.

Note: You will need to download the Worksheet below to complete and turn in your assignment.

Complete this Coastal Community Profile for two of the following countries:

• The Philippines
• Bangladesh
• Vanuatu

Explore this site by selecting a country or clicking on the links provided above: (http://sdwebx.worldbank.org/climateportalb/home.cfm?page=country_profile...) and make notes on the following in order to create a picture of coastal vulnerability. Focus on those factors that contribute to coastal hazards, such as sea level rise, frequency of storms, population distribution, and poverty levels.

1. Overview: Describe two or three key factors mentioned here that may put many people at risk of coastal hazards (e.g., population trends and distribution, topography of the islands).
2. Climate baseline: What climate-change related trends have been witnessed in recent decades in relation to coastal hazards (e.g., frequency of tropical cyclones)?
3. Natural Hazards: How is sea level rise likely to impact the population? What makes some communities particularly vulnerable to sea level rise and storm surge?
4. Climate Future: What is the projected sea level rise by the end of the 21st Century? What causes of uncertainties and spatial differences are likely to come into play here?
5. Impacts and Vulnerabilities: What information is given on the Frequency of Typhoons? What other climate trends may affect coastal communities?
6. Adaptation: - (focus on Coastal Resources tab and the Urban Areas and Infrastructure tab). What are some of the main recommendations for the people living close to the coast?

Summary of Findings:

All of the countries on the list have a relatively low per capita Gross Domestic Product (GDP). As you know, this is a measure of wealth of the country and this in turn is related to how well people can recover from a disaster or deal with a hardship (resilience). The population size and distribution is also important, as the wealth of any country must be shared by its residents. Review the information you gathered related to GDP, and write a short summary explaining how the wealth of two countries you chose impacts the ability of its residents to cope with the coastal hazards of their region, such as a cyclones.

Files

Download the Worksheet (Microsoft Word 2007 (.docx) 15kB Sep7 16)

Download Rubric (Microsoft Word 2007 (.docx) 61kB Sep7 16)

Submitting Your Assignment

Use the tools in your CMS to submit your assignment.

Instructions

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Figure 6.3: This online portal has a wealth of information about climate change effects in a range of locations across the globe. You can find the locations using the map on the main page shown above in the screen capture.
Credit: GFDRR

After navigating to a geographic location via the map, the page will look like this:

×

Figure 6.4: A screen capture of a geographic map.
Credit: GFDRR

The tabs across the top of the page will take you to these pages:

• Climate Baseline
• Natural Hazards
• Climate Future
• Impacts and Vulnerabilities
• Adaptation

Spend a little time exploring each of these pages for both of your locations. There is a lot of information to be gleaned from this site. Organize your information on your worksheet and also remember to note the main points on your Coastal Vulnerability Audit Worksheet.

• Completing Your Coastal Community Profile