Earthquake Vs Haiti Earthquake

In 2010, a huge earthquake hit Haiti and almost flattened the tiny country. A year later, in 2011, an equally huge if not bigger earthquake hit Japan. Many people were affected in Japan but now the country is running smoothly again while Haiti’s poverty rates are still as a high as 80%. Why did these earthquakes have such different effects on these countries? The most significant reason these earthquakes had such different effects is the simple matter that Japan is just much more prepared than Haiti due to more economic, political, and educational development.

First off, before the earthquake, Haiti was still pretty bad off. Haiti's exports were worth 726.3 million. Although that is a lot of money this was nothing compared to the 788 billion that Japan’s exports were worth. This shows that Haiti has much higher susceptibility in their country due to their underdeveloped economy. Japan also has many more means of transportation and communication in their country. Japan has 175 airports while Haiti has only 14 airports. Japan also has thousands of miles of railway tracks while Haiti has none.

Secondly, Japan puts much more
Japan has a reliable government in which they can count on for good disaster warning systems. This gives Haiti very high lacks of coping capabilities. Although, some people may say that the reason Haiti’s earthquake had more devastating was because Haiti had a higher exposure rate, therefore, having a more serious earthquake. I disagree. Although Haiti’s earthquake may have been more severe, that was not the main reason there were such different effects. The real facts are that Japan has low vulnerability while Haiti has high. This is due to all the risk factors such as susceptibility, lack of coping capabilities, and lack of adaptive capacities. This is why these countries had such different amounts of damage after their