ABSTRACT
We begin with four stories about humanitarianresponse to natural disasters: famines in Sudanand Chad, a flood in Vietnam, and a volcanic eruption in Ecuador. This is but a small sampling of natural disasters, or natural hazards, as they are called in the aid business. Others are hurricanes, typhoons, cyclones, wind storms, earthquakes, insect infestations, extreme temperatures, droughts, landslides, epidemics. The entries on this list, culled from a UN report generated by the ISDR (International Strategy for Disaster Reduction), sounds like a litany of biblical plagues.
