Uneven distribution across incomes and regions The distribution of disaster displacement provides insights into the drivers of global disaster risk patterns. Climate change is affecting the frequency and intensity of extreme weather events, but most of the change in disaster risk over the relatively short period of time covered by IDMC’s data is linked to exposure and vulnerability. Most striking is the strong correlation between displacement and populations’ exposure to natural hazards.109 Human settlement patterns are closely linked to historical and recent processes of economic development and population growth, particularly in urban areas. Since 1970, population growth in urban areas has taken place at almost twice the global rate, and more than three times as fast in urban areas of low and middle-income countries.110 Thirty-eight per cent of displacement associated with disasters in 2016 occurred in upper middleincome countries (see figure 1.17). The figure of more than nine million people was more than double the previous year’s, and reflects the persistently high exposure of dense and growing urban populations. In many middle-income countries, urban growth has been poorly and governed, leading to both high exposure and vulnerability that affects the poorer and more marginalised segments of society disproportionately. High-income countries also faced significant new displacement but at a similar level to 2015, with a figure of 2.3 million accounting for around nine per cent of the global total. These included the US and Japan, which are regularly among the countries with the highest figures worldwide, but also – more unusually – Israel, where wildfires displaced 75,000 people or almost one in 100 of the country’s population. Low and lower middle-income countries such as DRC, Haiti, and Bangladesh accounted for 12.7 million displacements in 2016. Here disaster risk tends to go hand in hand with rapid and poorly planned urbanisation and the growth of informal settlements where building standards and landuse plans are not enforced.111 This should be of particular concern because governments and affected populations in such countries generally have less capacity to minimise, respond to and recover from disasters or to mitigate the adverse impacts of displacement. More than two-thirds of all new displacement associated with disasters in 2016 took place in East Asia and the Pacific, where 16.4 million incidents accounted for 68 per cent of the global total (see figure 1.18). Most took place in upper middle and lower middle-income countries. The figure is almost double the 8.4 million displacements in 2015. China accounted for 45 per cent of the regional total, with 7.4 million new displacements. The country experienced its wettest year on record in 2016, with 16 per cent more rainfall than the long-term average. The Yangtze river basin flood season was the most significant since 1999.112 Figure 1.17: New displacements by disasters by income group, 2016 Lower middle income Low income 48.1% - 11.6m 4.5% - 1.1m High income TOTAL 24.2m 9.4% - 2.3m Upper middle income 38.0% - 9.2m Source: IDMC, with World Bank data 36 GRID 2017