The Role of Scientifi c Modelling and Insurance in Providing Innovative Solutions for Managing the Risk of Natural Disasters - Reducing Disaster: Early Warning Systems for Climate Change - page 321

between universities, insurers, reinsurers, catastrophe modelling companies,
government research institutions and non-governmental organisations.
(ii) The Lighthill Risk Network ( www.lighthillrisknetwork.org ) promotes collabo-
ration between insurers, reinsures and brokers and facilitates knowledge trans-
fer into business, from academic, government, professional and commercial
experts at the forefront of risk-related research. It recently initiated a project
called the Open Access Catastrophe Modelling Framework (OASIS) in col-
laboration with the UK Met Offi ce. OASIS has the potential to deliver a larger
choice of models, better understanding of the models and will assist companies
with Solvency II compliance. It will also incorporate existing industry stan-
dards for collecting and sharing data, such as the Association for Cooperative
Operations Research and Development (ACORD, www.acord.org ).
(iii) In response to the lack of open-access catastrophe models, the OECD started
the Global Earthquake Model (GEM, www.globalquakemodel.org ) in 2006.
This

35 m project aims to measure and communicate earthquake risk world-
wide. GEM considers the hazard, exposure, vulnerability and socioeconomic
impact of earthquakes.
(iv) The World Bank and UN International Strategy for Disaster Reduction
(UNISDR) promote risk assessment projects and the integration of insurance
into disaster risk management strategies. The Central American Probabilistic
Risk Assessment ( www.ecapra.org ) also provides a suite of tools for evaluat-
ing and communicating risk.

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17.4.2 Internet and Social Media Help Understand Risk

Social media offers many opportunities for exchanging knowledge and ideas and is
contributing to the development of improved risk management. 'Understanding Risk'
( http://community.understandrisk.org ) is a global forum that meets every two years to
bring together experts and practitioners in disaster risk assessment. Improvements in
risk assessment coming from this group include innovations in satellite imagery,
remote sensing, crowd sourcing and web-based mapping applications.
Another recent example, the Global Risk Register (GRR, www.globalriskregister.
org ) , was launched in 2011 by academia, business, non-governmental organisations
and governments. The GRR is an international community of risk experts, who
share and manage information about global risks in order to make decisions based
on their combined pool of information and intelligence. Organisations that partici-
pate in the GRR stand to improve their assessment and analysis of risk by tapping
into this collective resource and expertise.
The GRR works via a website where participants can identify current and emerg-
ing risks, establish measures to control these risks and collect information. It is
expected that the GRR will facilitate knowledge exchange, encourage research and
innovation and support the formulation of policies and legislation that improve risk
management activities.