Possibilities of the Republic of Serbia for reducing vulnerability to natural hazards

Abstract

Vulnerability is an essential feature of an element at risk (community, region, country, the environment) which determines the expected damage caused by a hazard. Vulnerability modified over time and it depended on physical, social, economic and environmental factors. Vulnerability became multidimensional, multidisciplinary, multi-sectoral and dynamic in contemporary circumstances. In the past decades, vulnerability to natural hazards took precedence over technological and other hazards threatening the community. The necessity to assess threat, vulnerability and the prevention of natural hazards was emphasized in the key national normative legal acts of the Republic of Serbia. A resolute commitment of the country to lay down the laws to regulate this field and establish a system to make a functional response to natural hazards through institutions was followed by difficult circumstances in practice. In addition to permanent flood hazard vulnerability, landslide and earthquake vulnerability, weak socio-economic profile i.e. the insufficient flexibility of the community and the unclear role of government bodies, municipal civil protection service and the service for protection from natural disasters were also insufficiently equipped. Nowadays, government efforts to solve problems in order to improve its own possibilities for reducing vulnerability to natural hazards are evident. The most important are those related to proper financing of the protection system. The application of SCN model would provide a more stable transfer of financial resources, as well as the transfer of necessary manpower and material resources from national to local level.