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Impact of Disaster Risks on Regional Economic Resilience in China: A Case Study of Wenchuan Earthquake

Received: 22 August 2019    Accepted: 28 August 2019    Published: 20 September 2019
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Abstract

The occurrence of disasters has a great impact on the sustainable development of cities and regions. This makes the ability of urban economic system to deal with disaster risk and its ability to recover development after being disturbed by disasters become two important indicators to measure the economic resilience. Unlike the study of economic shocks, we identify sectors of the economy that are sensitive to disaster disturbances in urban systems. It is of great significance to explore the structure of economic activity which is related to improve the stability and driving force of urban economy resilience. This paper establishes the premise hypothesis according to the Urban Economy Basic Theory. The object is the structure of urban Basic and Non-Basic economic activities. Taking the Location Quotient as the observation index, the economic resilience level of disaster risk area was explored through the empirical study of Wenchuan earthquake. The results show that the Investment, Finance, Government Finance, Transportation and Social Welfare sectors are the endogenous drivers of the post-disaster economy, which can quickly stimulate economic recovery in the short term but lack of sustainability. Besides, the development of Industry, Retail Trade, Construction, Education and Health Care need to be driven by external support. In the short term, the growth rate is not significant, but it is the main driving force of long-term economic development after the disaster. On the other hand, Government Finance, Social Finance Investment, Construction, Transportation and Social Welfare departments have undergone reverse changes between Basic and Non-basic economic activities after the earthquake, indicating that the earthquake disaster has a subversive effect on the turbulence of regional economic structure. Therefore, on the basis of extending the perspective of economic resilience researches, this paper discusses the method for assessing urban economic resilience, and puts forward some suggestions on how to improve resilience in the disaster risk areas.

DOI 10.11648/j.ss.20190805.15
Published in Social Sciences (Volume 8, Issue 5, October 2019)

This article belongs to the Special Issue Emergency Management

Page(s) 245-254
Creative Commons

This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, provided the original work is properly cited.

Copyright

Copyright © The Author(s), 2024. Published by Science Publishing Group

Keywords

Resilience, Economic Activity Structure, Disaster Risk, Location Quotient, Wenchuan Earthquake

References
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Author Information
  • Institutes of Science and Development, Chinese Academy of Science, Beijing, China; University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China

  • Institutes of Science and Development, Chinese Academy of Science, Beijing, China; University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China

  • Institute of Engineering Mechanics (Key Laboratory of Earthquake Engineering and Engineering Vibration), China Earthquake Administration, Harbin, China

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    Dan Zhou, An Chen, Jianfei Wang. (2019). Impact of Disaster Risks on Regional Economic Resilience in China: A Case Study of Wenchuan Earthquake. Social Sciences, 8(5), 245-254. https://doi.org/10.11648/j.ss.20190805.15

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    ACS Style

    Dan Zhou; An Chen; Jianfei Wang. Impact of Disaster Risks on Regional Economic Resilience in China: A Case Study of Wenchuan Earthquake. Soc. Sci. 2019, 8(5), 245-254. doi: 10.11648/j.ss.20190805.15

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    AMA Style

    Dan Zhou, An Chen, Jianfei Wang. Impact of Disaster Risks on Regional Economic Resilience in China: A Case Study of Wenchuan Earthquake. Soc Sci. 2019;8(5):245-254. doi: 10.11648/j.ss.20190805.15

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  • @article{10.11648/j.ss.20190805.15,
      author = {Dan Zhou and An Chen and Jianfei Wang},
      title = {Impact of Disaster Risks on Regional Economic Resilience in China: A Case Study of Wenchuan Earthquake},
      journal = {Social Sciences},
      volume = {8},
      number = {5},
      pages = {245-254},
      doi = {10.11648/j.ss.20190805.15},
      url = {https://doi.org/10.11648/j.ss.20190805.15},
      eprint = {https://download.sciencepg.com/pdf/10.11648.j.ss.20190805.15},
      abstract = {The occurrence of disasters has a great impact on the sustainable development of cities and regions. This makes the ability of urban economic system to deal with disaster risk and its ability to recover development after being disturbed by disasters become two important indicators to measure the economic resilience. Unlike the study of economic shocks, we identify sectors of the economy that are sensitive to disaster disturbances in urban systems. It is of great significance to explore the structure of economic activity which is related to improve the stability and driving force of urban economy resilience. This paper establishes the premise hypothesis according to the Urban Economy Basic Theory. The object is the structure of urban Basic and Non-Basic economic activities. Taking the Location Quotient as the observation index, the economic resilience level of disaster risk area was explored through the empirical study of Wenchuan earthquake. The results show that the Investment, Finance, Government Finance, Transportation and Social Welfare sectors are the endogenous drivers of the post-disaster economy, which can quickly stimulate economic recovery in the short term but lack of sustainability. Besides, the development of Industry, Retail Trade, Construction, Education and Health Care need to be driven by external support. In the short term, the growth rate is not significant, but it is the main driving force of long-term economic development after the disaster. On the other hand, Government Finance, Social Finance Investment, Construction, Transportation and Social Welfare departments have undergone reverse changes between Basic and Non-basic economic activities after the earthquake, indicating that the earthquake disaster has a subversive effect on the turbulence of regional economic structure. Therefore, on the basis of extending the perspective of economic resilience researches, this paper discusses the method for assessing urban economic resilience, and puts forward some suggestions on how to improve resilience in the disaster risk areas.},
     year = {2019}
    }
    

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  • TY  - JOUR
    T1  - Impact of Disaster Risks on Regional Economic Resilience in China: A Case Study of Wenchuan Earthquake
    AU  - Dan Zhou
    AU  - An Chen
    AU  - Jianfei Wang
    Y1  - 2019/09/20
    PY  - 2019
    N1  - https://doi.org/10.11648/j.ss.20190805.15
    DO  - 10.11648/j.ss.20190805.15
    T2  - Social Sciences
    JF  - Social Sciences
    JO  - Social Sciences
    SP  - 245
    EP  - 254
    PB  - Science Publishing Group
    SN  - 2326-988X
    UR  - https://doi.org/10.11648/j.ss.20190805.15
    AB  - The occurrence of disasters has a great impact on the sustainable development of cities and regions. This makes the ability of urban economic system to deal with disaster risk and its ability to recover development after being disturbed by disasters become two important indicators to measure the economic resilience. Unlike the study of economic shocks, we identify sectors of the economy that are sensitive to disaster disturbances in urban systems. It is of great significance to explore the structure of economic activity which is related to improve the stability and driving force of urban economy resilience. This paper establishes the premise hypothesis according to the Urban Economy Basic Theory. The object is the structure of urban Basic and Non-Basic economic activities. Taking the Location Quotient as the observation index, the economic resilience level of disaster risk area was explored through the empirical study of Wenchuan earthquake. The results show that the Investment, Finance, Government Finance, Transportation and Social Welfare sectors are the endogenous drivers of the post-disaster economy, which can quickly stimulate economic recovery in the short term but lack of sustainability. Besides, the development of Industry, Retail Trade, Construction, Education and Health Care need to be driven by external support. In the short term, the growth rate is not significant, but it is the main driving force of long-term economic development after the disaster. On the other hand, Government Finance, Social Finance Investment, Construction, Transportation and Social Welfare departments have undergone reverse changes between Basic and Non-basic economic activities after the earthquake, indicating that the earthquake disaster has a subversive effect on the turbulence of regional economic structure. Therefore, on the basis of extending the perspective of economic resilience researches, this paper discusses the method for assessing urban economic resilience, and puts forward some suggestions on how to improve resilience in the disaster risk areas.
    VL  - 8
    IS  - 5
    ER  - 

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