Preparing for destructive natural hazards is an urgent international concern. But for the Philippines, which the World Risk Report lists as the most at risk of disasters, this concern is significantly more acute. In a country where 15.7 million people still live below the international poverty line of 3.65 international dollars or P75.7 a day, multi-billion peso disasters are constant hammer blows to economic progress and human welfare.
Although consecutive administrations have poured immense efforts into bolstering disaster risk reduction and management (DRRM) in the country, multiple levels of Philippine government and society are still unprepared. By the mid-century, climate change will substantially intensify extreme weather events like typhoons, heatwaves, floods, and droughts. Our time is running out.
Why the Philippines is a “very high risk” country
The Bündnis Entwicklung Hilft’s World Risk Report in 2024 listed the Philippines on top with a “very high” risk score of 46.91. This is no anomaly; we hold the unenviable distinction of consistently being listed among the top three countries facing disaster risk. But how so?
The report calculates a country’s risk score based on its exposure to natural hazards, the susceptibility of its population, and its lack of coping and adaptive capacities.
Exposure refers to the location of people, infrastructure, and tangible human assets in hazard-prone areas. Susceptibility, or vulnerability, can be roughly understood as the likelihood of people and economic assets to suffer loss and damage. Coping capacity gauges society’s ability to withstand and respond to the impacts of natural hazards, while adaptive capacity describes the long-term processes for disaster prevention.
The Philippines does not hold the highest score in a single category, yet it scores high in all four simultaneously. In comparison, Japan faces an even higher exposure to natural hazards, but its lower susceptibility and greater capacity for coping and adapting bring its overall risk score down to 20.94—less than half of our country’s.
While they’re forces of nature, natural hazards need not turn into disasters. Disaster prevention strategies aim to address the different components of disaster risk. Exposure, for instance, can be reduced through sound land use planning and relocating communities away from high-risk zones. Meanwhile, vulnerability can be lowered by focusing on addressing poverty, expanding financial inclusion, and strengthening infrastructure. Coping and adaptation capacities come through early warning systems, nature-based solutions, and risk-informed development.
Yet, even well-intentioned strategies can quickly break down when met with local problems. Too often, relocations turn into forced resettlements, building codes are ignored, and disaster preparedness measures are left undelivered due to complex bureaucracy.
The fragile edge of disaster planning
On paper, the Philippines should have less of a problem dealing with natural hazards. The Philippine Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Act of 2010 provides a cornerstone to build up disaster preparedness, and under it, government agencies regularly develop multi-year disaster risk and management plans, sectoral plans, and climate change adaptation plans.
We also committed to the Hyogo Framework for Action and the newer Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction. Innovative financing policies like parametric insurance or anticipatory cash transfers were also pilot-tested or trialed here under various international agencies.
However, the Commission on Audit’s 2022 review of DRRM funds reveals a gulf between forward-thinking solutions and local implementation: only around 56 percent of local government units (LGU) were able to conduct risk assessments that included vulnerable sectors, 33 percent have digitized local risk maps, and 13 percent have a complete inventory of vital resources for emergencies. In terms of planning, only half of the LGUs had complete contingencies for top hazards, and a third of them had no contingency plans at all. Over a third did not have training for personnel and only less than a third had protocols responsive to marginalized populations.
These predicaments can be traced to where over half of LGUs had trouble integrating risk reduction and adaptation into their local development plans, and two-thirds have difficulty programming and budgeting DRRM funds. According to a 2021 report by the Pacific Disaster Center, the lack of technical training and skilled personnel have long hampered these kinds of processes.
This shortage in capacity means that local officials could completely miss out on marking flood-prone or landslide-prone areas, resulting in avoidable suffering. Vulnerable groups could be left to fend for themselves because of plans that failed to take them into account, and destroyed infrastructure leaves communities without even basic essentials.
These unequal disaster impacts have long been a reality for Filipinos. In this, the consequences stretch long after the disaster happened. A 2024 study published by Climate Analytics finds that typhoons in the Philippines cut down household incomes by around seven percent on average between 2004 and 2015. In more vulnerable and more highly exposed communities, that reduction can be more than 20 percent. Jobs in agriculture are also disproportionately affected, with fisheries seeing more than a 30-percent drop in income and livestock raising by as much as 15 percent.
The high price of falling short
In the face of persistently poor preparedness, we suffer the staggering economic impact of disasters. The National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council estimates that typhoons alone cost the country 1.2 percent of its gross domestic product (GDP), or the equivalent of around P317.36 billion from the 2024 GDP. Even then, these figures likely understate the real toll, especially in rural, remote, and poverty-stricken areas where data collection is weak. These figures also don’t reflect non-economic loss and damage, such as ecosystems, cultural heritage, and community practices, which are more difficult to quantify economically but just as important.
The P6.37-trillion national budget for the 2025 fiscal year does allocate some P1-trillion to fund enhancements in disaster resilience, climate change adaptation, and mitigation. It remains to be seen, however, if this kind of spending will break the constraints of inconsistent policy implementation and local capacity shortages.
As the world continues to veer into stronger climate-induced hazards because of rising emissions, Filipinos will remain one of the most disproportionately impacted. At the same time, we still continue to deal with the looming threat of other natural hazards like volcanoes and earthquakes.
The poorest households today already bear the brunt of disaster impacts: generations of one family end up spending nights in evacuation centers, floods drown their livelihoods, and destroyed classrooms wash away their childrens’ futures. Without urgent action, the World Bank estimates the Philippines could lose up to 13.6 percent of its GDP to disaster damages by 2040—losses that will fall hardest on the most vulnerable. With stakes this high, there is no excuse not to invest in resilience and disaster risk reduction. It’s even overdue.
The frameworks exist, the science is clear, and the potential is visible, but the risks are also growing. Intentions must be matched with delivery. Our knowledge will mean little if they stall at the last mile. Investments in resilience must reach those who are most at risk, and falling short will prove to be too costly.
This article was published in The LaSallian‘s June 2025 issue. To read more, visit bit.ly/TLSJune2025.
