Integrated seismic risk in developing countries: the case-studies of Palestine and Algeria

This paper presents dedicated frameworks, developed within European-funded projects, to create integrated seismic risk models from scratch for developing countries and raise the awareness of the general society. Focusing on the case-studies of Nablus in Palestine and Blida in Algeria, the different components of the risk model (hazard, exposure and vulnerability) are described. In specific, details are provided on: improved Hazard models (considering historical and instrumental catalogues for the West Bank and Northern Algeria); the collection of exposure and fragility data on buildings and bridges throughout the case-study regions, used to develop specific exposure and vulnerability models; the definition of social vulnerability models through census-based and scorecard approaches. Subsequently, the integration of the different components is carried out towards the calculation of integrated risk and considerations on the specificities surrounding developing countries are made. The final products of the seismic risk models can be used by different stakeholders to quantify risk and plan mitigation measures.