Disaster risk assessment at Roburnia Plantation, Mpumalanga, South Africa

Jàmbá: Journal of Disaster Risk Studies

 
 
Field Value
 
Title Disaster risk assessment at Roburnia Plantation, Mpumalanga, South Africa
 
Creator Makhado, Rudzani A. Saidi, Amani T.
 
Subject Disaster management; Risk managemnet; Fire ecology Disasters; risk assessment; risk equation; fire; Roburnia Plantation
Description This study reports about disaster risk assessment undertaken at Roburnia Plantation, Mpumalanga Province, South Africa. Both quantitative and qualitative approaches were followed to collect data. A total of eight experienced foresters and fire fighters were purposively sampled for interview at Roburnia Plantation. A questionnaire survey was also used to collect the data. Risk levels were quantified using the risks equations of Wisner et al. (2004) and the United Nations International Strategy for Disaster Reduction (UNISDR 2002). Data were analysed using descriptive and inferential statistics. Analysis of variance (ANOVA, single factor) was also applied. This study found that Roburnia Plantation is highly exposed to fire risks. The mean (± s.d.) output from the Wisner risk equation shows that fire is the highest risk at 7.7 ± 0.3, followed by harsh weather conditions at 5.6 ± 0.4 and least by tree diseases, pests and pathogens at 2.3 ± 0.2. Similarly, the mean (± s.d.) output from the UNISDR risk equation also shows that fire is the highest risk at 2.9 ± 0.2, followed by harsh weather conditions at 2.2 ± 0.3 and least by tree diseases, pests and pathogens at 1.3 ± 0.2. There was no significant deference in the risk analysis outputs (p = 0.13). This study also found that the number of fire incidents were low during summer, but increased during winter and spring. This variation is mainly due to a converse relationship with rainfall, because the availability of rain moistens the area as well as the fuel. When the area and fuel is moist, fire incidents are reduced, but they increase with a decrease in fuel moisture.
 
Publisher AOSIS
 
Contributor Department of Science and Technology (DST) and the National Disaster Management Centre (NDMC)
Date 2013-07-15
 
Type info:eu-repo/semantics/article info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersion — —
Format text/html application/octet-stream text/xml application/pdf
Identifier 10.4102/jamba.v5i1.64
 
Source Jàmbá: Journal of Disaster Risk Studies; Vol 5, No 1 (2013); 6 pages 2072-845X 1996-1421
 
Language eng
 
Relation
The following web links (URLs) may trigger a file download or direct you to an alternative webpage to gain access to a publication file format of the published article:

https://jamba.org.za/index.php/jamba/article/view/64/202 https://jamba.org.za/index.php/jamba/article/view/64/203 https://jamba.org.za/index.php/jamba/article/view/64/204 https://jamba.org.za/index.php/jamba/article/view/64/201
 
Coverage Plantation forest — —
Rights Copyright (c) 2013 Rudzani A. Makhado, Amani T. Saidi https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
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