In its annual World Disasters Report the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies says that floods, storms, landslides and droughts, which numbered about 200 a year before 1996, rose sharply and steadily to 392 in 2000.

"Recurrent disasters from floods in Asia to drought in the Horn of Africa, to windstorms in Latin America, are sweeping away development gains and calling into question the possibility of recovery," the report says.

Blaming the trend on global warming, Roger Bracke, its head of disaster relief operations, said: "These are also the most deadly events; it is probable that these kind of disasters will increase even more spectacularly.

"There is a natural limit somewhere to what humanitarian assistance can do; we are afraid that there will be a point where we can no longer provide assistance."

Scientists working for the United Nations say that more frequent extreme weather is one of the signs of global warming, and low-lying island states are the first at risk, because of the predicted rise in sea levels and their exposure to harsher tropical storms.

With 41% of its population of about 380,000 killed or affected between 1991 and 2000, the Solomon Islands heads the first league table complied of countries struck by disaster.

Two other island groups in the south-west Pacific, Tonga and Micronesia, are in the top eleven.

Floods accounted for more than two-thirds of the 211m people a year on average affected by natural disasters in the past decade.

Famine caused by drought affected nearly a fifth, and accounted for most deaths: about 42% percent of all those caused by natural disasters.

The federation said the impact of climate change in poor countries placed an enormous responsibility on aid-giving states, commenting: "The latter commonly both create the problem and set the terms by which it will be managed."

It suggested that poor countries might seek legal compensation to pay for reconstruction through an "international tort climate court", adding: "Increasingly sophisticated analysis of climate change means that ignorance of the consequences of industrial consumption and pollution can be no defense for inaction".

The report points out that the poor are the most vulnerable to disasters, 88% of those affected and two thirds of those killed in the past 10 years living in the least developed countries.

But emergency international aid to the poorest countries declined in the late 1990s and the amount sent elsewhere rose sharply.

The federations criticizes the quality of most emergency aid, saying that donors focus on high-profile projects, to "rebuild infrastructure, not people's livelihoods", and often fail to keep long term commitments to affected countries.

"We feel very often there is a lack of understanding of what really works, and very often donors want visibility," Mr Bracke said.

The chance of recovering from a disaster is weakened by "the widespread leakage of aid dollars".

Nearly two-thirds of the funds spent on a flood action plan in Bangladesh in 1990-95 left the country to pay foreign aid consultants, thereby undermining the local economy, the report comments.

© Guardian Newspapers Limited 2001

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