CANADA: Weather-related natural disasters in 2005 have racked up $200 billion in economic losses, with insured losses running at more than $70 billion.
These are the worst figures on record.
The preliminary estimates by Munich Re, one of the world's largest reinsurance companies, exceeded the previous record figures of $145 billion and $45 billion respectively for 2004.
Partly due to the highest number of hurricanes or tropical storms since records began in 1850, this year's estimates are part of a climbing trend linked by many in the insurance industry to climate change.
Thomas Loster, the Munich Re Foundation's chief executive, said the figures were "a powerful indication that we are moving from predictions of the likely impacts of climate change to proof that it is already fully under way".
Industry experts also point to growing scientific evidence that major tropical storms in the Atlantic and Pacific have increased by about 50 per cent since the 1970s, including the first-ever hurricane to approach Europe.Economic losses from weather-related disasters between 1950 and 2004 have shown a far stronger trend than those linked to earthquakes, such as the tsunami in south Asia last December or the recent earthquake in Kashmir.
"We do not want to underestimate the human tragedy of earthquakes, which can kill tens of thousands of people a year. But our findings indicate it is the toll of weather-related disasters that's the one on the rise," Mr Loster said.
Hurricane Katrina, the sixth-strongest on record, has been the most costly weather-related disaster ever, with economic losses totalling more than $125 billion and insured losses likely to exceed $30 billion.
Meanwhile, according to the UN Environment Programme a small community living in the Pacific island chain of Vanuatu has become the first to be evacuated as a result of climate change after their coastal homes were repeatedly inundated by storms.
