ABSTRACT
The aims of the conference on Disaster Risk Reduction for Natural Hazards: Putting Research into Practice were twofold: to examine how natural hazard research is accessed and used by practitioners and decision and policy makers; and to explore how policy and practice inform research. Communication plays a pivotal role in putting research and knowledge into practice and needs to be effective for, all stakeholders including scientists, NGOs, government decision makers and local communities. Very little connection was made between global environmental change and natural hazards, which was somewhat surprising given the current focus on the potential impacts of climate variability on vulnerable populations. The nature of risk also changes depending on whether there is a single hazard or there are multiple hazards, as well as context-specific social, economic, political and cultural issues that create and exacerbate vulnerability. Decision makers may be aware of the risk, but be unable or unwilling to act on it.
