Introducing SPIN: a new tool for assessing spatial inequality
To allow for more comprehensive climate risk assessments, Haskoning has developed an internal tool to help our experts explore how climate disasters impact people’s livelihoods, and support the process of identifying measures to protect the most vulnerable communities in the event of flooding and other climate disasters.
In this blog, we’ll look at how Haskoning’s Spatial Inequality tool, SPIN, works, what it can deliver, and why this kind of solution is vital for today’s risk assessments.
What is spatial inequality and why is it so hard to measure?
Spatial inequality refers to the uneven distribution of critical resources and services (such as healthcare, welfare, public services, household income, and infrastructure) across different areas and populations.
Accessibility to resources is determined by several factors (such as socio-economic, cultural, gender- or age-related etc.). However, it also has a physical dimension, and this can be measured by physical distance to a resource, and availability per capita.
Spatial inequality is not interchangeable with social vulnerability. However, it can help describe specific variables that are used to measure social vulnerability, as uneven distribution of resources can lead to socio-economic challenges – especially when disaster strikes.
In the past, spatial inequality has been difficult to measure and assess because:
- Socio-economic data can be scarce and is rarely aggregated on a neighbourhood level.
- Demographic data often lacks relevant vulnerability indicators that are needed to measure social vulnerability.
- When spatial data is available, assessments are complex, time consuming, and require extensive knowledge of Geographical Information Systems.
What does SPIN do?
As part of Haskoning’s mission, Enhancing Society Together, we knew we needed to overcome data scarcity and find a simple, feasible, and optimised approach that could provide insights about social vulnerability during climate disasters – while putting communities at the centre of our analysis.
During our Digital Talent Programme last year, one team developed a spatial inequality assessment tool, SPIN, that combines all the essential steps of spatial inequality analysis into a single process.
Designed for use by Haskoning engineers and consultants, it processes data on road networks, origin and destination points, and other potential barriers to offer powerful insights into inequality and risk.
Using SPIN, Haskoning experts can help guide clients on routes to critical infrastructure and calculate how far certain communities have to travel for essential services, which routes are used most frequently, and how people’s mobility might be affected by floods and other potential disasters.
This can help inform:
- Risk mitigation strategies that can be used in climate adaptation projects.
- Accessibility mapping for different groups based on gender, age, vulnerabilities, and more.
- Spatial planning to identify locations for new facilities and for different uses of the transport network, as well as the impact of losing connections.
- Disaster relief, providing insights into infrastructure network bottlenecks, as well as potential locations for facilities.
The need for spatial inequality assessments
As more of our clients began to require social vulnerability assessments, we saw limitations in the approaches available. For a variety of reasons, many methodologies tend to prioritize economic damage to assets over livelihood of communities. This realisation became a tipping point during one of our flood risk mitigation projects in Dakar, inspiring the development of the Spatial Inequality Tool.
Dakar, with its strategic geographical location, is a financial and administrative hub for West Africa. That’s why it has rapidly gained international importance and attracted foreign capital.
However, the city contrasts with the rest of the region in terms of socio-economic opportunities and quality of life. Rural areas around Dakar face significant disparity in terms of the availability of services and infrastructure, meaning people must travel long distances to access healthcare and other vital services that are only available in larger towns.
Due to uncontrolled urbanisation in parts of the region, rural areas around Dakar started to experience severe flood events which will only intensify in the future. As a response to this challenge, Haskoning was appointed to carry out a comprehensive flood risk assessment and propose an adaptation strategy.
While the assessments provided insights on the direct damage to physical assets and population, it didn’t foresee that several communities were at risk of losing access to essential services due to road disruptions. This knowledge gap was captured by the team and addressed in the project just in time, however it required additional steps and manual analyses.
After the project was completed, it became apparent that there will be more projects where a strong understanding of spatial inequality can lead to improved outcomes and increased community centred resilience in the case of extreme weather events.
Learn more about SPIN
SPIN helps colleagues throughout the world to better understand the spread of resources and services, how this impacts different demographics and communities, and how this careful balance is affected by the impacts of climate change.
While SPIN is not available for public use, Haskoning experts can use the tool to offer more insights as part of our work with our clients. These insights will be vital in meeting the challenges of climate change, optimising town and city planning, and Enhancing Society Together.
Losing access to essential resources during climate disasters can be life-threatening. By making invisible vulnerabilities visible using SPIN, we can help communities become more resilient!
Want to know moreor got a question?
Contact our Climate Resilience experts!