Zhe Ying Ng SUS E 502 Marwan Ghandour Mentor: Austin Stewart
Design for resilience: Planning for disaster recovery and mitigation in Nepal
Introduction On April 25th, 2015,an earthquake with a magnitude of 7.8M hit Nepal and killed over 8000 people and injured more than 21000. A year after the catastrophic disaster, millions of people are estimated to still be homeless and the country is struggling to recover. The aftermath of the earthquake and the lack of quick recovery uncovered complex underlying issues that pertain to the failure of disaster preparedness. But along with all the frustration during the recovery process, there are still opportunities to create a more resilient community for the future. Due to the analysis, this project proposes developing an urban environment that does not only plan for short-term recovery, but establishes a more resilient environment to prepare for future disasters where damage could be minimized and recovery expedited. In order to identify the cause of the slow recovery, this project maps the earthquake and its aftermath in Kathmandu focusing on seven basic components in disaster management: damage, shelter, health, food, WASH (water, sanitization, hygiene), protection & education. The relationship and connection between these components were being studied according to the timeline that spanned from days to year. Nepal has 1/3 of its population living below the poverty line, and is ranked 19th among the poorest nations of the world because of the political instability over the past few decades (Tasch, 2015). After the disaster, the country had slipped further on Corruption Perception Index (CPI) 2015 of Transparency International, with a score of 27th among 167 surveyed countries (Sharma, 2016). The earthquake worsened the humanitarian issues that the country is experiencing. More women, teenagers and children are suffering from high risk of displacement, migration, child marriage, child labor, discrimination, violence and human trafficking. Due to all the underlying social issues, recovery is challenging in Nepal. Hence, the proposal needs to plan not only for the disaster preparedness, but also provide solutions to improve the resiliency of socially vulnerable groups, seeking initiatives for the community betterment. Through this study, I hope to develop a study method(plan) for recovery that could be utilized in other disaster prone contexts. The seven components would be the basic criteria to evaluate the different disaster contexts, but the analysis may present different social issues. One of the biggest problems that occurred during the emergency relief period was food security. Within the first three days before the international aid arrived, the people around