Estimating lifeline resilience factors using post-disaster business recovery data

Abstract

Recent studies have discussed lifeline resilience factors for industrial sectors. However, these results are derived from business surveys on hypothetical disasters or estimations based on expert opinions: this is mainly due to a lack of data from businesses that actually experienced lifeline disruptions after a disaster. Therefore, this study proposes a modeling framework to estimate the remaining proportions of production capacity after lifeline disruptions due to a disaster, called lifeline resilience factors, in different business sectors. Lifeline resilience factors are estimated using a production function based on responses from a post-disaster business survey in areas affected by the 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake. A comparative study between the manufacturing and non-manufacturing sectors was conducted to understand their relative resilience and vulnerability. The results show the varying importance of different lifeline services among sectors and are consistent with those of existing studies. These findings make a significant contribution in confirming the reliability and stability of lifeline services for post-disaster economic impact analysis.