Global Risk Modelling Organisation exporting the GEM model to other perils

1. Global Risk Modelling Organisation exporting the GEM model to other perils Mauro Dolce | Head of Seismic Risk Service, Italian Civil Protection Rui Pinho | Secretary General, GEM Foundation

2. THE NEED (a reminder) Risk mitigation requires “accurate”, consensual and uniform risk information. Since natural hazards know no political boundaries and do not necessarily occur frequently at the same location/country/region, a global knowledge-sharing approach is required, which should lead also to the development of socio-economic impact assessment tools, including cost-benefit analysis, involving both the public and the private sectors, as well as international organisations, professionals associations and the wider community..

3. CRITICAL FEATURES OF A RISK ASSESSMENT TOOL • It must consist of a state-of-the-art, independent, transparent/open and consistent standard/model to calculate risk • It must be dynamic, modular, flexible, expandable (i.e. not necessarily just a map or report) • It should serve the needs of all possible users, from the general public to the decision makers, communicating risk in an effective manner • It needs to be community-based and public-owned, in order to be consensual, accepted and actually used • It has to feature regional involvement and coverage, and facilitate technology-transfer

4. THE GLOBAL EARTHQUAKE MODEL “A global collaborative effort aimed at engaging the global community in the design, development and deployment of state-of-the-art models and tools for earthquake risk assessment worldwide”

5. PUBLIC-PRIVATE PARTNERSHIP they contribute 13.6 M Euro 7 private organisations have partnered up with GEM so far 9 countries have adhered so far discussions and negotiations are ongoing with 15+ others the OECD, WorldBank, UNESCO, UN/ISDR, IAEE and IASPEI are associative participants

6. GEM SO FAR • After 2 years of activity: • 23 public-private partners have joined • 75% of 5-year core budget secured • More than 50 institutions working on projects for development of global data & methods • More than 100 institutions involved on a regional scale • Hundreds of international experts actively engaged • First beta-release of the open-source computational software OpenQuake in January this year • Interaction with many stakeholders started already (e.g. Red Cross, UN-ISDR, World Bank, Media, etc) • Outreach Meetings (e.g. Washington 2010) with 250+ participants • Newsletter read by over 2000 subscribers

7. GLOBAL COMPONENTS Hazard Global Earthquake History Global Instrumental Earthquake Catalogue Global Active Fault and Seismic Source Database Global Ground-Motion Prediction Equations Global Geodetic Strain Rate Model Risk GEM Ontology and Taxonomy Global Exposure Database Global Earthquake Consequences Database Global Vulnerability Estimation Methods Inventory Data Capture Tools

8. REGIONAL PROGRAMMES Feeding and feedbacking global models..

9. COLLABORATION ON DATA & METHODS Global Exposure Database construction material, height, age, occupancy.. Sub-Saharan Africa RP European RP South American RP

10. A GLOBAL COLLABORATIVE EFFORT

11. CALCULATING AND COMMUNICATING RISK Scenarios of use of OpenGEM

12. GRMO - THE RATIONALE Capitalise on the GEM experience (with both its successes and errors/lessons), and thus introduce an initiative that would have the objective of establishing community-based uniform and open standards for calculating and communicating hazard, vulnerability and risk data worldwide, derived from natural and man-made hazards.

13. GRMO - THE RATIONALE • Such a (tentatively called) Global Risk Modelling Organisation (GRMO), would consist of an Intergovernmental Organisation aiming at: • facilitating global integration of existing regional efforts (for those cases where these exist) • enabling wider adhesion of member states (with respect to GEM) • catering for economies of scale in the development of software and IT infrastructure, compiling exposure information, developing socio-economic impact tools • easing gathering of standardised, globally available multi-hazard datasets • enabling comparison of various types of risks over wide geographical areas and transcending national and regional boundaries

14. POSSIBLE Structure • As mentioned already, GRMO would be an intergovernmental organisation, hence featuring the participation of member states (i.e. countries/governments) and associated participants (IGOs, International Associations, etc) • It would possibly comprise a General Assembly of member countries, a Steering/Monitoring Committee, and three main operative modules common to all types of risk, namely: Exposure, Socio-Economic Impact and IT Infrastructure • It is envisioned that “Strategic Programmes” would be organised/deployed for the different areas of risk, and possibly managed independently by dedicated organisations, associated to GRMO and located in different regions of the world, both in the northern and southern hemisphers.

15. POSSIBLE Structure

16. SERVING STAKEHOLDERS WORLDWIDE The models and tools are to meet the needs of a wide group of prospective users and beneficiaries and will need to include features that support the work of all those entities and individuals working and deciding on risk resilience and mitigation. The models will, through their interfaces, allow for risk assessment at the community, national and international level and integration with many ongoing initiatives on disaster risk reduction. National, Regional and Local (City) Governments Engineering & Building Institutions Disaster Management and Risk Programmes / Organisations • Global Scientific & • Technical Community • Universities and Research centres • Individualexperts • (Earth Sciences, ClimateSciences, Social Sciences, Environmental/ SustainabilityStudies, Geography / Urban Planning, Information & CommunicationTechonology, Development Studies) • Private Industry • Insurance • Banking • Utilities, Energy • Construction • Leisure/Tourism • Consultancy • Information & • Communication Technology GRMO Individuals NGOs and Civil Society Organisations Intergovernmental / other International Organisations Media online / offline

17. SUGGESTED NEXT STEPS • Initiate a wide scoping discussion with relevant organisations and/or initiatives, such as ISDR, WMO, UNESCO, UNU, TWB, IDRC, IRDR, ICSU, etc • Tap the scientific communities in the different domains (floods, volcanoes, tsunamis, landslides, wildland fire, etc), through the corresponding global associations/initiatives, if already in-place (e.g. GEM, ICL, IFI, etc) • Engage states/governments, at ministerial level, in these brainstorming discussions, so as to secure the necessary political backing (note that the institution of an IGO calls for parliamentary approval and adhesion of at least three countries) • Partner with the private sector from the onset, since, as shown by GEM, this is key to the success of any such type of initiative • Present and discuss the idea at venues such as the Global Science Forum of the OECD (meeting this Friday, in Lisbon), and at the upcoming Global Platform (feasible?)

19. AIMS By operating at a global scale it will be possible to create synergy, share knowledge on natural and man-made hazards and approaches for risk assessment that will improve our understanding, and make it possible to enlarge datasets, especially in those areas where such information is hardly accessible. Involving the global community is integral to the effort, to ensure that the models and tools are being developed and deployed collaboratively, in a transparent way and facilitated by open debate. In that way, GRMO hopes to build authority and to include ever-more experts, organizations and governments in its network, to support continuous improvement of the models and their application for users and beneficiaries around the globe. GRMO aims thus to develop a flexible, modular platform for disaster risk assessment. This platform will enable both expert and basic users to execute applications, carry out disaster risk assessments on both regional and global scale, develop in-depth knowledge of socio-economic impact and to visualise risk maps, tables and curves and export these in compatible formats. The platform will connect individual users through a user network and will allow expert users to upload and ‘plug in’ their own data. GRMO shall be the technical/scientific instrument to support decisions and actions reducing losses due to catastrophes, and shall integrate developments on the forefront of scientific research in several modules, including hazard, vulnerability, exposure, socio-economic impact and risk.