During the last year, many Asian countries have witnessed flooding, including Bangladesh, China, India, Japan, Laos, North Korea, Pakistan, Thailand, the Philippines and Singapore.
The economic damage has varied significantly - minor in Singapore but very substantial in Thailand.
The floods have once again brought the twin issues of disaster management and development to centre stage. With climate change and its effects expected to increase the magnitude of water-related disasters, it is important to rethink why some of the current flood disasters turned out to be unmanageable, with unprecedented human and material losses. Full story
