Some communities were more fortunate than others: they were warned that a wave was on its way and had some minutes to seek higher ground. Some were not.

Natural hazards are not new, and natural hazards do not in themselves pose a threat.

But our world has shrunk through the interconnectivity brought about through globalization. And humans have pushed the planet beyond its boundaries. Man-made hazards, like financial system collapse, or radiation are also bringing new risk. The very nature of risk has changed: systemic and cascading risk, where a risk may start out one way, like a tsunami and end up as another risk, as in the nuclear station melt down in the huge Japan earthquake of 2011.

If we want to get on top of sustainable development then we must deal move from managing disasters, traditionally done reactively to managing risk – proactively.

We have seen some extraordinary changes in understanding and approaching risk:

For example, Nigeria has committed to the world’s largest rural roads programme, with an investment of US$500 million, and all contract bids must be risk-informed and take account of resilience.