Abstract
This article investigates the impact of household endowments on household’s ability to cope with natural disaster risks and the determining factors of disaster coping capacity. We present results of a research based on household survey. The data were analyzed with an ordered Probit model regression. The project surveyed 923 rural households in 2009 and 2010 in 39 national-level poverty-stricken counties of Sichuan, Yunnan, and Guizhou Provinces and Chongqing Municipality. This research determined that the economic strength of households is the most important factor affecting their disaster coping capacity. The ability of farming households to cope with disasters is also significantly impacted by family members’ experiences and their economic context at the village level. Ethnic minority areas in southwestern China are the poorest in the country and are often the main disaster-affected areas. Since household endowments significantly affect the ability of farming households to cope with disasters, integration of disaster risk management and poverty reduction is a viable way of enhancing coping capacity of farming households to natural disasters.
Highlights
In the past decade in China, major natural disasters primarily affected ethnic minority regions and rural areas
Based on the household survey data, the effects of household endowments on the response ability of farmers to natural disasters are analyzed with an ordered Probit probability model in this study
The results show that the experience of family members is an important factor that affects the response ability of farmers to disasters
Summary
In the past decade in China, major natural disasters primarily affected ethnic minority regions and rural areas. At the end of the 1990s, Anderson and Woodrow (1998) stressed the need to identify the capacities that already exist in societies when designing disaster-related development interventions Since this positive aspect has been further explored. Existing studies on disaster risk management in minority areas generally approach the issue from the macro level of the government or the market. These approaches lack enough concern for farmers who have a very important role in disaster response. The research intends to establish a baseline for future studies in farmers’ response ability to disasters in ethnic minority areas
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