A Comparative GIS Framework for Multi-Hazard Risk Assessment: Floods in India and Droughts in China

Although GIS has been heavily applied in measuring disaster risks, disaster assessment has been restricted to only one type of disaster, and there has been no comparative evaluation on whether the GIS approaches can be used in other processes of disasters assessments. In an attempt to address this gap, this paper proposes a Comparative Case Study and selects two typical instances of calamities, which are floods (sudden-onset disaster) in Gujarat, India, and droughts (gradual-onset disaster) in Southwest China. The study has involved the application of multi-source data (environmental, meteorological, socioeconomic) and GIS spatial analysis methods and created high-risk areas spatial distribution maps. The comparative results indicate that the use of the GIS technique can be easily adjusted to support disasters of all sorts, yet the weights of the data selection and analysis processes have to rely on certain disasters. The soil distribution of the risk of flooding is rigidly loaded about the low features of topography, and the drought risk is arbitrarily distributed over time under the protracted weather patterns and the topography features. Besides authentication of such great GIS capabilities in the determination of multi-hazard risks, this study will be a transferable methodology guide and decision support for such research in addressing the hazards of the same compound calamities in other regions, due to its comparative model.