Fact Sheet

BUREAU OF DEMOCRACY, HUMAN RIGHTS, AND LABOR

April 19, 2013

Natural disasters1 in 2012

In 2012, 310 natural disasters were recorded in the EM-DAT database. They claimed 9,930 lives, affected over 106 million others and caused economic damages of US$138 billion.

There were no mega-disasters in 2012 in terms of human impact.

The largest disaster of 2012 in terms of mortality was Typhoon Bopha in the Philippines that resulted in 1,901 deaths. It was the strongest tropical cyclone on record to hit the southern Philippine island of Mindanao and affected over 6 million persons.

The world has experienced three consecutive years where annual economic losses have exceeded $100 billion due to an enormous increase in exposure of industrial assets to extreme disaster events.

Oliver RichmondIoannis Tellidis, 1 February 2013

JOHANNESBURG, 10 January 2013 (IRIN) - In another four decades, urban residents will account for 66 percent of the population in developing countries, says the Population Division of the UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs (DESA).

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Following is UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon’s message to the International Conference on Food Security in Drylands, in Qatar on 14 November:

I am pleased to send greetings to the International Conference on Food Security in Drylands, and I thank His Highness Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad bin Khalifa Al-Thani and the Qatar National Food Security Programme for organizing it. I also thank Qatar for hosting the forthcoming 18th Conference of Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change.

The Foreign Office has published new reporting on 28 Countries of Concern, along with updates on the case study countries featured in the annual human rights report. The quarterly updates cover the period from July to September 2012.

The 2011 Human Rights and Democracy Report is online to make it as accessible to the public as possible. It highlights the UK’s human rights policies and concerns on key issues, and features 28 Countries of Concern where the FCO has the most serious wide-ranging human rights concerns.

Figures “reassuring” but vigilance needed – FAO DG

6 September 2012, Rome - The FAO Food Price Index averaged 213 points in August 2012, unchanged from July.

Presenting the Index at a press conference at FAO headquarters in Rome, Director-General José Graziano da Silva said “This is reassuring. Although we should remain vigilant, current prices do not justify talk of a world food crisis. But the international community can and should move to calm markets further,” he added.

BANGKOK, 23 August 2012 (IRIN) - Almost a year after the government promised Thailand's farmers a fixed price for their rice harvest, concerns that the system would push up world rice prices may be unwarranted, as experts now forecast lower financial returns.