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Severe droughts have occurred frequently in various parts of the United States throughout the 20th Century. These natural disasters caused severe hardship not only on the agriculture sector of society, but also on the entire socio-economic infrastructure. Until recently, governments and relief agencies responded to a drought disaster from a crisis perspective in a purely reactive approach. However, a comprehensive disaster management approach has emerged over the past decade, shifting from reactive relief to proactive risk management. Risk management is based on preparedness and mitigation measures. Interagency collaboration led to the development of a coordinated national drought policy.

This Chapter describes recent events in the development and application of a national drought policy in Australia. Prior to the 1990s, Government assistance to drought-affected farmers and pastoralists was based on the assumption that drought was an unpredictable natural disaster. A paradigm shift towards the present policy of “self reliance” occurred in the early 1990s. Under this policy, farmers were expected to be able to manage through most droughts, with Government assistance only available in the event of droughts of unusual length or severity — so-called “exceptional circumstances.” Details of the policy, and its application in, and following, drought situations, are briefly outlined. Illustrated by the experience of 2002–03, one of Australia’s worst-ever droughts, we show that the development of drought policy in Australia is an ongoing process, in which attempts to apply aspects of the policy in practice generally reveal deficiencies, leading to subsequent modification of the policy. Areview of National Drought Policy conducted by the Australian Government after the 2002–03 drought generated a number of recommendations. Among these were: the nearly universal endorsement by stakeholders that proactive drought preparedness measures should be encouraged by Governments; and that improvements were needed to the reliability of seasonal predictions, with calls for better-coordinated research into climate variability, and better presentation of prediction information. The Chapter also describes changes in water management policy in Australia, which also underwent a fundamental change during the early 1990s. Case studies are provided of certain aspects of the policy, including the application of water entitlements in rural areas, and water restrictions in urban areas. The Chapter discusses some likely future developments, including discussion of the possible implications for drought policy posed by future climate change.

This Chapter describes the role of public education and training in mitigating the effects of natural disaster in Australia. Emphasis is on weather- and climate-related disasters, which have historically caused heavy economic losses, and sometimes significant loss of life. Three main themes are identified: (a) the continued development of a community-oriented approach to hazard minimisation, in which communities are encouraged and trained to take measures to protect themselves and their property when adverse weather or climate situations threaten; (b) issues involved in educating potential beneficiaries in the effective use of climate information to minimise impacts from climate extremes; (c) underpinning both the foregoing to some extent, the importance of developing a sound communication strategy between authorities responsible for disaster management, the people likely to be affected, and the media. In describing the community involvement programs (Sect. 13.3), attention is focussed on responses to the threat posed by bushfires in southern Australia, and tropical cyclones in northern Australia. Public education campaigns, designed to minimise adverse effects of severe storms, skin damage due to solar radiation, and heatwaves are also described (the latter two elements are not high profile hazards, but have been responsible for many deaths in Australia). Sect. 13.4 briefly describes capacity-building activities designed to enable the effective use of seasonal climate predictions, a valuable tool in mitigating the effects of drought, both within Australia and over the South Pacific. It is shown that, while extensive educational and awareness campaigns over the past decade have led to increased use of seasonal climate predictions in decision-making by the agricultural sector, a number of barriers remain to more widespread acceptance of this tool. Section 13.5 highlights the importance of good two-way communication between service providers and end users to ensure information is relevant, adequately understood, and effectively applied. The role of the media in communicating information during times of major climate events, such as drought, is also discussed. We conclude with a summary of some promising avenues for improving the effectiveness of managing natural disaster through educational and training activities, along with some thoughts on the implications of future climate change.

Efficient management of risks due to meteorological disasters is very important in China because of their increasing occurrence and limited capability for prevention and preparedness in China. Losses due to meteorological and related disasters account for more than 70% of the natural disaster losses in China. Early warning and prediction of agrometeorological disasters includes improvements in statistical prediction models, predictions based on climate prediction and agrometeorological models, and early warning for agrometeorological disasters using GIS. Risk assessments of agrometeorological disasters are based on identification of risk and use of models to characterize disaster intensity, disaster loss and the capability to combat disasters. Several ways of popularizing the preventive measures of agrometeorological disasters were described with suitable examples.

Natural disasters are known to cause severe economic losses and in many developing countries in the form of decline in agricultural production, destruction of food reserves, damage to water supplies, etc. This report focuses on land use strategies to mitigate natural disasters including tropical storms, floods, droughts, dust storms and sand storms, frosts, volcanoes, landslides, bush, and forest fires. It is important that disaster preparedness and prevention projects are built into a wider development strategy. Mitigation efforts need an integrated and concerted action by all the agencies concerned. Long term disaster reduction efforts should aim at promoting appropriate land-use in the disaster-prone areas, by harmonizing land suitability with agricultural development strategies.

Drought is a many faceted natural disaster that leads to serious socioeconomic impacts particularly affecting agricultural production and water supplies. There are two distinct phases in which the application of the knowledge of weather and climate can reduce the impact of drought on the communities. The first is the long term planning in which strategies can be devised, and precautions taken to reduce impact. The second phase is the action taken during the onset of the event to reduce adverse effect. Efforts were made to stabilize dryland agriculture by evolving contingent crop production strategies in rainfed areas of India. Drought management policies included agricultural planning and practices with consideration of overall water requirement within the individual agroclimatic zones. The ill effects of drought, to a considerable extent, can be alleviated by adopting proper crop management strategies. These strategies may vary from moisture conservation to manipulation of plant population, and even mid-season corrections. Rainfall also can be harvested in either farm ponds or in village tanks and can be recycled. In case of drought mitigation, it was recommended that economies diversify to include agro-industry or various tertiary products, which could create new forms of income. The focus in mitigation should be on measures like improvement in agriculture, management of rangeland, development of water resource and animal husbandry. There is an urgent need to develop appropriate policies and strengthen institutional mechanisms for drought preparedness and mitigation accompanied by concrete programs.

Drought and flood are the most frequent and severe natural disaster. With the development of remote sensing and GIS technology, early detection and monitoring of drought and flood using remote sensing and GIS has become a reality in China. The paper summaries the status of the field including the methods and data used. It especially presents the methods and products for early detection and monitoring of drought and flood developed by National Satellite Meteorological Center (NSMC), and gives an example of Flood monitoring.

Using the Doppler radar radial velocity data simulated by Rankine combined vortex and observed by a Doppler radar and typhoon yearbooks, the applied study about the objective positioning methods of a typhoon was made. Two methods had been established. A series of simulated and actual tests were made for the two methods. The results show that the errors of the two methods in simulated tests are below 0.5 ∼ 1 km and those of radial maximum wind are below 0.12 km. Compared to the best operational track data, the errors of the two algorithms in actual tests are below 3 ∼ 13 km, sometimes those are below 3 km. So it is feasible to decide the center of a tropical cyclone with the data of a single Doppler radar radial velocity in operational tropical cyclone positioning. The positioning results of the two methods are of important reference and guidance in operational tropical cyclone forecasting and warning.

Forest, shrub-steppe, and grassland fires have come under the inclusive terminology of wildland fire. In the past decade, fire occurrence and area of surface burned has increased dramatically. This increase in wildland fire frequency and intensity has been driven by climate variability and in some countries, worsened by fuel management policies. Many areas that have been burned are in remote areas of the world where collection of information on fires is either difficult or impossible on the ground. Satellite remote sensing has been applied to this problem with some remarkable successes in locating large fires, mapping the areas burned, and tracking smoke plumes. For smaller fires, pixel size limitations have led to use of aircraft based sensor development. To understand fire ecological consequences, parameters such as fire intensity, fuel consumed, and heat release rate to atmosphere must be understood. In parts of the Southwest Pacific Region, the potential for fire occurrence is exacerbated by lack of infrastructure common to more developed areas. The use of remote sensing, geographic information systems, and computer models will allow fires to manage to lower risks.