China's first collection of natural disaster risk maps released

The "Collection of China's Natural Disaster Risk Maps," the culmination of10 years of natural disaster risk research, was recently released in Beijing. The maps highlight the regional distribution characteristics of China's various types of natural disasters and are China's first such comprehensive natural disaster "risk maps."

The collection of maps includes more than 400 maps and scores of statistical tables based on hundreds of years of records on natural disasters and related losses in China and displays the distribution of China's natural disasters from a unique angle. It is noteworthy that the collection of maps shows that the level of China's natural disaster risks have a downward trend from eastern regions to western regions.

Seven regions, namely the region covering the Yangtze River Delta and the areas along the lower reaches of the Yangtze River, the Huai River drainage area, the region covering the North China Plain, Beijing, Tianjin and Tangshan, the region of Hunan and Hubei provinces, the Fen-Wei Basin, the Sichuan Basin and the lower reaches of Liaohe River, are most exposed to comprehensive natural disasters.

Furthermore, the collection of the maps also includes risk assessments of natural disasters in China, such as earthquakes, typhoons, floods, landslides, sandstorms, snow, hailstones, frost, forest fires and prairie fires. It focuses on regional distribution characteristics, the regularity of these natural disasters as well as the spatial differences of the comprehensive natural disaster risks among different provinces, municipalities and autonomous regions.

Shi Peijun, chief editor of the collection of maps and deputy director of the National Disaster Reduction Commission, said that this scientific achievement will provide specific evidence for various levels of governments and enterprises to make disaster prevention measures, enhance the public awareness of risk prevention and improve ordinary residents' disaster prevention and self-rescue skills.

By People's Daily Online

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