A Heat Vulnerability Index: Spatial Patterns of Exposure, Sensitivity and Adaptive Capacity for Urbanites of Four Cities of India

Extreme heat and heat waves have been established as disasters which can lead to a great loss of life. Several studies over the years, both within and outside of India, have shown how extreme heat events lead to an overall increase in mortality. However, the impact of extreme heat, similar to other disasters, depends upon the vulnerability of the population. This study aims to assess the extreme heat vulnerability of the population of four cities with different characteristics across India. This cross-sectional study included 500 households from each city across the urban localities (both slum and non-slum) of Ongole in Andhra Pradesh, Karimnagar in Telangana, Kolkata in West Bengal and Angul in Odisha. Twenty-one indicators were used to construct a household vulnerability index to understand the vulnerability of the cities. The results have shown that the majority of the households fell under moderate to high vulnerability level across all the cities. Angul and Kolkata were found to be more highly vulnerable as compared to Ongole and Karimnagar. Further analysis also revealed that household vulnerability is more significantly related to adaptive capacity than sensitivity and exposure. Heat Vulnerability Index can help in identifying the vulnerable population and scaling up adaptive practices.

Digital contact does not promote wellbeing, but face-to-face contact does: A cross-national survey during the COVID-19 pandemic

With restricted face-to-face interactions, COVID-19 lockdowns and distancing measures tested the capability of computer-mediated communication to foster social contact and wellbeing. In a multinational sample ( n = 6436), we investigated how different modes of contact related to wellbeing during the pandemic. Computer-mediated communication was more common than face-to-face, and its use was influenced by COVID-19 death rates, more so than state stringency measures. Despite its legal and health threats, face-to-face contact was still positively associated with wellbeing, and messaging apps had a negative association. Perceived household vulnerability to COVID-19 reduced the positive effect of face-to-face communication on wellbeing, but surprisingly, people’s own vulnerability did not. Computer-mediated communication was particularly negatively associated with the wellbeing of young and empathetic people. Findings show people endeavored to remain socially connected, yet however, maintain a physical distance, despite the tangible costs to their wellbeing.

Kesepakatan Menunda Kehamilan Bagi Pasangan Muda Perspektif Hukum Islam: Upaya Menekan Pernikahan Dini di Masa Pandemi

This research is an attempt to look deeper into why delaying early marriage is appropriate during the COVID-19 pandemic based on the view of Islamic law and the human rights approach. The phenomenon of early marriage during the pandemic had appeared and even jumped based on the data collected. This phenomenon encourages conditions of vulnerability (fiqh: mudharat) which will have an impact on the emergence of new problems and even conflicts for young people, especially if they already have children, given the pandemic conditions that often threaten the household economy. This study departs from the question of why Islamic law and human rights must play a role in reducing the number of early marriages during the pandemic based on the assumption of household vulnerability? How is the phenomenon of early marriage during the pandemic seen from the point of view of human rights and maqasid? This research is analytical descriptive with qualitative methods, and data collection is carried out by literature study on secondary materials to observe the phenomenon of early post-marriage during the pandemic. The results show that the function of Islamic law and human rights can be an important instrument to suppress the surge in early marriage, which will save young households from the vulnerability of household conflicts based on observations made during the covid pandemic.

Household Vulnerability to Food Insecurity and the Regional Food Insecurity Gap in Kenya

Food insecurity remains a vital concern in Kenya. Vulnerable members of the population, such as children, the elderly, marginalised ethnic minorities, and low-income households, are disproportionately affected by food insecurity. Following the pioneering work of Sen, which examined exposure to food insecurity at a household level using his “entitlement approach”, this paper estimates households’ vulnerability to food insecurity. In turn, the outcome variable is decomposed in order to explain the food insecurity gap between households classified as “marginalised” and “non-marginalised”. We applied the Oaxaca-Blinder decomposition method to examine vulnerability to food insecurity and, in particular, contributions of observed differences in socio-demographic characteristics (endowments) or differences in the returns to these characteristics, which, in our context, is associated with poor public services and infrastructure in the vicinity of the household. The results indicated that differences in vulnerability to food insecurity were mainly attributable to observed differences in socio-demographic characteristics such as education, age, and household income. Therefore, policies seeking to attain equity by investment into targeted household characteristics in terms of access to food and other productive resources could effectively combat food insecurity. For example, policymakers could develop programs for household inclusiveness using education and social protection programs, including insurance schemes against risk of endowment loss.

Towards Dynamic Assessment of Determinants of Household Vulnerability to Poverty in Tanzania

The paper examines the determinants of vulnerability to expected poverty in Tanzania. Following Landau et al. (2012), Chaudhuri (2000) and Chaudhuri et al. (2003) on estimating Vulnerability to Expected Poverty (VEP), the paper uses a three waves of Tanzania National Panel Survey Data for Tanzania collected between 2008/2009, 2010/2011 and 2012/2013 to find that being employed in agriculture, residing in rural area and household size turns out to be significantly more likely to be poor in the future, at a given consumption level and in all cross-section combination. It also appeared that most of the variables were statistically insignificant at influencing the conditional variance of future consumption across household characteristics. Lastly, nearly 39.42% and 59.49% of households who were poor in 2008 turned out to be less vulnerable in 2010 and 2012 respectively and the rest turned out to be high vulnerable. Thus, consumption stabilization strategies are likely to be influential if they target families whose household head is aging.