Natural Hazards

• UNESCO/CSI/LINKS, Bangkok
• UNDAC and UNESCO Bangkok teams visiting Baan Khem (Phang Nga province), one of the hardest hit villages during the tsunami of 26 December 2004

Natural hazards are naturally-occurring physical phenomena caused either by rapid or slow onset events having atmospheric, geologic and hydrologic origins on solar, global, regional, national and local scales.

Natural disasters are the consequences or effects of natural hazards, but natural phenomena do not automatically have to spell disaster.

As the UN's agency for science, UNESCO has been intimately involved in disaster reduction for the past 45 years, with studies on earthquakes and oceanography dating back to the 1960s. It has since expanded into many areas as it pursues multidisciplinary actions to study natural hazards and mitigate their effect.

- Earthquakes
- Tsunamis
- Floods
- Tropical Cyclones
- Landslides
- Droughts and Desertification
- Volcanoes
- Slow Onset Hazards
- Specific Risks of Coastal Regions and Small Islands
- Climate Change