Economic losses caused by natural disaster cost more than 794.2 billion won in 2011, but the cost of restoration after disaster reached 1.654 trillion won: twice as much as the losses. In particular, flood damage from national, regional, and small rivers amounts to 206 billion won, which accounts for 25.9 percent of overall natural disaster damage.
    River disaster management refers to all measures used to reduce and prevent the detrimental affect of natural disasters such as floods and typhoons. National, regional, small rivers, and mountain streams are applicable to this report. The main focus is on shore-protection work as a preemptive measure.
    According to evaluation of river disaster management, some sections of national rivers didn’t require repairs, yet budget is consistently allocated to river bank repairs. In case of establishing budget for regional small river and erosion control dams, these require more investment than national rivers, so draft budgets should be prepared by municipal governments. Furthermore, budget for those projects, allocated by each municipal government, have not been submitted to the National Assembly. Therefore, We recommend that the project for erosion control dams needs performance management, so river management should vary based on present river rank in each basin.

Kim Sujin