World Bank and RMSI Team Up To Undertake Drought Vulnerability Analysis

NEWARK CA, October, 2005: The Indian state of Andhra Pradesh depends heavily on agriculture, and thus has an economy vulnerable to drought and resulting watershed management decisions. The State government in Andhra Pradesh has many mitigating programs in place, which the World Bank sought to compliment by creating models to better forecast the economic impact of various climate and risk mitigation scenarios - impact of drought on crops, analyze and quantify the impact of potential future droughts in the state, compute direct losses including probable maximum and average annual losses and assess the impact on various sectors of the state economy and make suggestions for cost effective risk financing. World Bank has enlisted RMSI to provide the necessary expertise in agro-meteorology, natural disaster risks, and macroeconomics (the study of the sum of individual economic decisions).

The ongoing project has produced a comprehensive report, which serves as a critical foundation to further investigation, analysis, and planning. The project has also established RMSI as a one-of-a-kind business partner among the many affiliates of the World Bank. According to RMSI CEO Ajay Lavakare, “We were selected because RMSI is unique in being able to deliver formidable expertise in both geotechnologies, and the development of risk assessment models.”