Agriculture damage data collection: A model for reconstructing comprehensive damage dynamics

Abstract

Natural disasters may disrupt and affect negatively agricultural development and production. Extreme events that strongly threaten the Agriculture Sector are predominantly those related to weather and climate, which are likely to become always more frequent and severe due to Climate Change effects (FAO, 2018; Sivakumar, 2005; PESETA III). In such a context, accurate sector-specific disaster losses and damage data are a crucial indication for policy-making and for evaluating progress in reducing disaster risk. A better understanding of the mechanisms impacting the Agriculture Sector is needed. This paper responds to the necessity of improved damage and loss data collection for the Agriculture sector, proposing a comprehensive conceptual model to support damage assessment. On the one hand, the proposed conceptual model has been designed to be compliant to the Sendai Framework requirements while enforcing the assessment of damages in agriculture with a multi-temporal dimension. Considering a multi-step assessment of damages is one of the main results that are implemented in the model. On the other hand, the Agriculture damage data stored in the proposed relational database would allow tracking the damage evolution enabling the understanding of damage dynamics. Another key factor is related to how the database has been conceived. The process starts with the analysis of international policies and guidelines. Then a practical solution is proposed based on the investigation of existing damage assessment forms. This exploratory approach allowed to create a model that represents not only the immediate, direct and physical impact of an event, but also the indirect and systemic consequences related to the inter- and intra-dependencies of the different elements constituting the Agriculture sector.