Assets at Risk and potential impacts. Cultural heritage

Abstract

The most widely used measures of disaster impacts are direct losses, which refer to the immediate physical damage to properties, infrastructure, agriculture and human life. Direct losses are mostly defined by monetary damage, fatalities and injuries, and currently dominate all other loss measures due to the tangible nature of physical damage. However, developing the capacity to include indirect losses as well as non-monetized losses into loss estimation is paramount in order to achieve a sound understanding and quantification of the full impact of disasters. In the context of the current chapter, this relates particularly to the damage of non-monetized resources such as cultural heritage assets and the relationship between them and society. To provide context and frame this issue, concepts related to cultural heritage, cultural significance and cultural value are first addressed. Different types of cultural heritage values are introduced and the conceptual and methodological issues related to the economic quantification of cultural heritage value are also discussed. These concepts are then connected to the issue of disaster impact analysis in cultural heritage, namely to the quantification of the loss in value of damaged cultural heritage. After reviewing current practice in this field, as well as addressing its limitations and the challenges it involves, the development of complimentary tools for a more efficient implementation of disaster risk management in cultural heritage based on disaster impact analysis is also examined. In particular, the chapter discusses the need to put into practice a resilience enhancement chain for cultural heritage connecting three elements: the reduction of disaster impacts in cultural heritage as a way to reduce disaster impacts in multiple sectors of society; the implementation of conservation and maintenance practices to reduce disaster impacts in cultural heritage; the availability of inventory and management systems with adequate information about the existing cultural heritage and about its condition to be able to implement efficient and rational conservation and maintenance practices. These elements are discussed in more detail, highlighting relevant technological advancements that are available.