Federico Fantechi, Ugo Fratesi (p), Felipe Livert

József Lennert

Socio-natural disasters threaten the pillars of sustainable development. They are becoming more frequent, are occurring faster and are increasingly unpredictable across multiple sectors, dimensions and scales (FAO, 2021). Indeed, in Italy between 2000 and 2019, 89 major disasters were recorded in which 21,000 people died, the number of people affected reached 230,000 people and economic losses are estimated at around USD 64 billion (CRED (Centre for Research on the Epidemiology of Disasters), 2020). The disasters that have increased considerably are fires and floods, which could be associated with the climate crisis (CRED 2020). In this context, the management of large-scale disasters is increasingly becoming a routine action for local governments. From the point of view of electoral, a key question is how voters judge leaders’ performance in dealing with a large-scale crisis.
Specifically at the local level, two questions arise: on the one hand, mayors want to know whether their electoral future will be associated with emergency management. On the other hand, the key question for voters is whether the incentive of re-election serves as a tool to encourage good performance by the politician. Voter reaction to leaders' performance in emergency management has important ramifications. If mayors know that they will be judged by their actions when they stand for re-election, they will be motivated to improve their performance. Given the increasing likelihood that communities will face climate catastrophes, it is important to understand how best to incentivise mayors to act well during an emergency.
Using a regression discontinuity design, this paper explores how disasters affect the incumbency advantage of mayors in Italy for the period 1993-2019. The disasters analysed are drought, wildfire, storm, landslide and flood. The results show that disasters increase the probability of re-election and the voting margin of incumbent mayors in affected municipalities. Moreover, the incumbency advantage is shown to be greater in smaller municipalities than in larger cities.

Jeongha Hwang (p), Yeongseon Baek, Joohwan Kim, Donghwan An, Kwansoo Kim

Ugo Fratesi

In summer 2018, South Korea experienced record-breaking daily maximum temperature and consecutive hot days; 48 people died of the unprecedented heat stroke and 4,526 were taken to the hospital due to heat illness. Given these huge risks to society, quantifying urban resilience against natural disasters, especially for heat waves, has become one of main issues in enhancing a sustainability of developed modern cities like Seoul in South Korea. In general, a city with high resilience to such a shock often confronts less impact from the disaster and tends to bounce back to its normal state in a relatively short time. This study first develops heat wave resilience index (HWRI) in South Korea at county level. The index is composed of various indicators accounting for the following 5 dimensions: economic, social, physical, municipal, and human dimensions, while the indicators are empirically validated by a machine learning technique. Through its prediction process, a random forest model allows us to evaluate whether the indicators do reflect urban resilience against heat waves. We then propose a stochastic damage function to assess marginal effects of urban resilience factors and extreme weather indicators on the mean and variance of damages from heat waves. The panel data used for this study span 6 years from 2015 to 2020 for 226 counties in South Korea; besides heat wave resilience index, the damages refer to both fatalities and economic losses reported to the government, and weather indicators are calculated in terms of extreme frequency and extreme intensity. The preliminary results suggest the followings: (1) The regions near big cities are likely to be more resilient to extreme heat events. (2) Facilities to prepare for heat waves have statistically significant effects on downsizing both scale and risk of extreme heat exposure, suggesting the effectiveness of enhancing urban resilience. This research contributes to a better understanding of urban resilience to the specific type of disasters. At the same time, this research makes empirical contributions as to the construction of an econometric model capable of evaluating marginal effects of urban resilience factors.

Lidia Poniży (p)

Jeongha Hwang

Climate change affects people in every corner of the globe, including city dwellers. Their number is constantly growing and it is expected that around 2030 it will reach 5.2 billion. In addition to such obvious ways of minimizing the negative effects of climate change, such as improving public transport, establishing green areas, and introducing green energy in public places, there is one more, the potential of which can be significant in the fight against climate change.
Urban agriculture, which has always existed in cities, is now gaining more and more popularity. These are not only monocultures cultivated within city limits, but also home gardens, allotments and horticultural farms. Although it may seem that only their users benefit from these types of farming, in fact all inhabitants benefit from their presence in cities. More than 90% of allotment gardens are unsealed, contributing to the infiltration of rainwater and the reduction of surface runoff. Unsealed areas covered with vegetation lower the city's temperature in the summer. In turn, food production as close as possible to the destination brings many benefits not only to the consumer but also minimizes the need to transport goods over long distances. Allotments and home gardens are also areas of high biodiversity.
Urban farming provides city dwellers with a range of benefits. The research identifies the ecosystem services provided by allotment gardens in Gorzów Wielkopolski (Western Poland). The study aimed to indicate the benefits related to collecting rainwater, food production, and biologically active surface, which may contribute to minimizing the negative effects of climate change.
The indicative approach to ecosystem services made it possible to quantify the benefits provided by allotment gardens and their potential to counteract climate change.
Provisioning services related to food production meet the demand of approx. 19% of Gorzów residents for fresh vegetables and fruits for 1/3 of the year, which allows for shortening supply chains and reduces the carbon footprint. On the other hand, rainwater retention minimises municipal water use by approx. 27%.

József Lennert (p)

Lidia Poniży

The aim of this paper is twofold. Firstly, to explore the regional differences and pace of the ongoing climate change in Hungary. Secondly, to evaluate the spatial differences in climate vulnerability of the Hungarian municipalities with consideration of different climate parameters and socio-economic indicators.

The sources of the climate data was the Meteorological Database and the Klimadat database of the Hungarian Meteorological Service (OMSZ). The Meteorological Database contains preceding weather data for observation points. The following steps were taken during the procession of the data:

• Data collection
• Preprocessing
• Evaluation of the relation between elevation and climate
• Interpolation
• Determination of the suitable indices

Between the time periods 2002-2011 and 2012 – 2021 there was a radical shift in the some of the climate parameters in Hungary. The mean annual temperature was increased more than 0.75 °C, and this was accompanied by a drastic rise in the number of heatwave days. Change in precipitation was minimal in country-level, but shows a very distinct spatial pattern. In the western and southwestern parts of the country, there is a noticable increase in the annual rainfall. On the other hand, significant reductions were observable in other parts of Hungary, especially in the northeastern territories.
The Klimadat database contains the spatial results of different climate scenarios. In the most extreme case, even an additional 2.6 °C mean annual temperature change is plausible until 2071-2100. However, in line with the present trends, the scenarios for precipitation are diverging, with a chance for significant (but territorially varied) increase especially for the first climate window (2021-2050). The spatial differences became more apparent after the use of more complex indices, e.g. the Palfai Drought Index.
The CIVAS model was adapted to determine the differences in the climate vulnerability of the Hungarian municipalities. While the selected climate and climate change parameters serve as exposure indices, different socio-economic indicators will be used to assess the sensitivity and adaptability of the municipalities. The exposure of general population, the agricultural sector and the tourism sector are also taken into account.

This research was supported by the Eötvös Loránd Research Network (ELKH), project title: “Possibilities for Hungarian local climate adaptation”.