International Recovery Platform

One of the major goals of WMO, NMHSs, and their systems, programmes and activities and their partners in disaster-prevention and mitigation communities is to reduce the number of deaths, injuries and damage caused by severe weather, climate and water

Turkey experienced severe losses of life and infrastructure in 1999 caused by the August earthquake. The earthquake was followed by a period of economic and financial crisis, culminating in a major currency devaluation in February 2001. What has been the

This Working Paper presents a cross-directorate report on the economic, budgetary, regulatory and urban policy implications of the earthquakes which struck the Marmara and Bolu areas of Turkey on 17 August and 12 November 1999. The earthquakes caused high casualties and significant material damage to property, with severe effects on economic activity. The Report traces the factors underlying Turkey’s vulnerability to earthquake damage, along a known active fault line, to deficiencies in risk identification procedures and risk-reduction methods, as well as to the absence of risk transfer and financing techniques. It suggests that these deficiencies may stem from the nature of recent Turkish economic development, which has been driven by the need to assimilate a mass migration from the countryside to the cities and has been associated with extremely high and variable inflation.