Publications Sub-Saharan Africa Geodetic Strain Rate Model 1.0 Share Facebook LinkedIn Download 2015 | Report InthisreportwedescribetheSub-SaharanAfricaGeodeticStrainRateModel1.0,whichisacontributionto theGlobalEarthquakeModelFoundation(GEM)StrainRateProject.Theobjectiveofthisworkistoimprove the latest GEM geodetic strain rate model with an updated strain rate field of sub-Saharan Africa. SubSaharan Africa encompasses the East African Rift System (EARS), the active divergent plate boundary between the Nubian and Somalian plates, which accommodates strain along the boundaries of at least 3 microplates.ThecurrentversionoftheGEMgeodeticstrainratemodelisconstrainedbypublishedgeodetic data along the EARS and includes microplates between the Nubian and Somalian plates. In this work we developedan improved strain rate field for sub-Saharan Africa that incorporates 1)anexpandedgeodetic velocity fieldwithin theNubia-Somaliaplatesystemandalong theEARS2) redefined regionsofdeforming zones guided by seismicity distribution, and 3) updated constraints on block rotations from the recent publicationofSariaetal.(2014).TheSub-SaharanAfricaGeodeticStrainRateModel1.0spanslongitudes22 to55.5andlatitudes-52to20with0.5°(longitude)by0.4°(latitude)spacing,whichincludespartorallofthe following platesand/or sub-plates: Somalia,Nubia, Rovuma, Lwandle, Victoria, Antarctica,and Arabia. For theseplates/sub-platesweassignrigidblockrotationsasboundaryconstraintsonthestrainratecalculation thatisdeterminedusingtheHainesandHoltmethodof fittingsplinestogeodeticdata foraninterpolated velocitygradienttensorfield.Wederivestrainrates,velocities,andvorticityratesfromthevelocitygradient tensorfield.FollowingtheworkofKreemeretal.2014fortheGEMgeodeticstrainratefieldwealsoprovide estimates of model uncertainties, velocities, vorticity, and strain rates in a Nubia-fixed reference frame relativetothelowermantlefora0.1°x0.1°mesh.

News FSEC and Atlantic Re Become First GEM Sponsors from Africa By: Jul 7, 2025 Jul 7, 2025 Share Facebook LinkedIn The Global Earthquake Model (GEM) Foundation has signed landmark agreements with Morocco’s Fonds de Solidarité contre les Événements Catastrophiques (FSEC) and with Atlantic Re, marking the Foundation’s first-ever public and private sector sponsorships from Africa. The agreement with FSEC was formalised on 27 June during GEM’s Summer Governing Board meeting, held as part of the Foundation’s semesterly governance session. The agreement with Atlantic Re was signed shortly after, on 7 July, when the CEO, Ms. Ouafae Mriouah visited the GEM headquarters in Pavia. In addition to signing sponsorship agreements, the three parties intend to also establish a tripartite collaboration which would outline plans to jointly develop Morocco’s first openly available national seismic hazard and risk model, in close cooperation with Moroccan scientists, engineers and institutions. The initiative aims to strengthen earthquake risk understanding in Morocco and support the development of science-based resilience strategies. “We are very pleased to welcome FSEC and Atlantic Re to the GEM family,” said Helen Crowley, GEM Secretary General. “This marks a major milestone for GEM – our first new public sponsor in seven years, and the first time we welcome both public and private sector sponsorship from the same country, and from Africa.” Established in 2019, FSEC is Morocco’s national solidarity fund mandated to provide compensation to victims of catastrophic events and to promote financial protection through insurance and reinsurance mechanisms. Atlantic Re, formerly known as Société Centrale de Réassurance (SCR), is a leading reinsurer headquartered in Casablanca with operations in more than 70 countries and a strategic focus on expanding its presence across the African continent and the Middle East. The collaboration reflects a growing recognition in Morocco of the need for robust seismic risk models to support national resilience planning. Situated at the convergence of the African and Eurasian tectonic plates, Morocco is exposed to moderate to high seismic risk, as highlighted by the 2023 Al Haouz earthquake, which caused at least 2900 fatalities. For FSEC, the partnership represents an increasing commitment to integrating scientific data and modelling into national disaster preparedness and financial protection strategies. “Joining GEM aligns with FSEC’s mission to strengthen Morocco’s resilience to catastrophic events through better risk understanding. This collaboration will contribute to building a scientific foundation for future public policy and financial protection strategies,” said Nouaman Al Aissami, Director, FSEC. Being part of CDG Groupe, the largest public investment fund in Morocco, Atlantic Re’s engagement complements this effort by bringing the private sector into a shared resilience agenda – one that connects earthquake risk reduction with sustainable insurance solutions. “This partnership reflects our shared commitment to reducing the protection gap in Northern Africa. By working with GEM and FSEC, we aim to support the development of scientific tools and risk models that benefit not only Morocco’s insurance sector, but also the broader public by promoting disaster preparedness and resilience,” said Abderrahim Oulidi, Head of CAT Risk department at Atlantic Re. Atlantic Re's CEO, Ms. Ouafae Mriouah (left) and GEM's Secretary General, Helen Crowley. GEM champions open access to its global data, models and tools, all freely downloadable from its website. Sponsorship, however, enables institutions to engage more deeply through tailored training, advanced models, technical collaboration and participation in global initiatives. Public sponsors also benefit from partnerships with leading research and government institutions worldwide, while private sponsors gain opportunities to collaborate with global experts. Work on the Moroccan model is expected to begin in the second half of 2025, with a kick-off workshop currently being planned. The collaboration is designed to support long-term knowledge sharing and help reduce disaster risk across the region. For more information on how to become a GEM public or private sponsor, or to discuss tailored technical cooperation, please get in touch with info@globalquakemodel.org or visit https://www.globalquakemodel.org/get-involved . No images found. GALLERY IMG_0355.HEIC gem fsec signing 1 IMG_0356.HEIC gem fsec signing 2 PXL_20250707_113741769_edited.jpg IMG_0355.HEIC gem fsec signing 1 1/11 VIDEO RELATED CONTENTS

News Technology transfer in the Middle East By: Jul 2, 2018 Share Facebook LinkedIn The four-day workshop organized by GEM in collaboration with the Kandilli Observatory and Earthquake Research Institute (KOERI) on March 14-18 continues the work carried out by the partners in the region and lays the foundation for long-term collaboration. In the framework of the USAID/OFDA-funded project, the workshop was implemented as part of the process to develop tools and procedures needed to establish a global network of GEM implementing partners. They will have the capacity to perform risk analyses and provide technical support and training in their regions, while coordinating with the GEM Secretariat in the improvement of methodologies and models according to local needs.Participants came from eight countries in the Middle East area (including Turkey), which had already contributed to the Earthquake Model for the Middle East (EMME) project under KOERI’s leadership. This time they were guided on the use of the OpenQuake-engine to perform urban risk assessments. The impact of the training was immediate: by the end of the workshop all participants managed to run a large number of hazard and risk calculations and visualize the resulting hazard, damage and loss estimates. Thanks to the training, participants had the opportunity to perform scenario calculations for their own regions and obtain damage and loss statistics for their cities. “This was one of the most successful workshops we have ever organized – said Vitor Silva, Risk Coordinator at GEM – “and I was impressed by the rapid learning ability on the use of the GEM tools”. This is certainly also a testimony to the improved computational efficiency and usability of the OpenQuake-engine interface and shows that GEM is on the right path in the development of its tools and methodologies, as well as in the adoption of appropriate technology-transfer mechanisms. Moreover, participants were impressed by the wide range of data and models available in the OpenQuake Platform and provided positive feedback on its potential contribution to the reduction of disaster risk around the world. The workshop ended with a short introduction to socio-economic vulnerability and integrated risk assessment and a dedicated session on the way forward. The participants decided to create a GEM-EMME community to promote long-term collaboration under KOERI‘s and GEM’s leadership. A corresponding proposal was submitted by the participants immediately after the workshop. No images found. GALLERY 1/0 VIDEO RELATED CONTENTS

News Perfect time for partnerships and collaboration: Hannover Re By: Mar 12, 2019 Share Facebook LinkedIn Changing times Hannover Re, a top reinsurer in the world and a long-time Global Earthquake Model (GEM) sponsor believes now is the perfect time for partnerships and collaboration to adapt to the rapid technological changes and shifting risk management approaches in the reinsurance sector. These changes are fueled by high availability and affordability of technology; increasing vulnerability of poor population throughout the world; and more sophisticated risk-based regulatory frameworks. Open source, open access initiatives Model results are forming the basis for all types of risk transfers and Hannover Re sees that open source risk models will increasingly become the ‘currency’ for insuring, transferring and trading catastrophe business between an expanded base of stakeholders in the future. “The Independent and objective way that GEM is developing the Global Earthquake Risk Model could potentially provide this ‘currency’ and significantly spark market interests,” Jörg Steffensen (L) – General Manager, Hannover Re Group Risk Management Modelling. He also foresees that GEM could be used as a blueprint for future projects to develop open global models for windstorm or flood. GEM is the only not-for-profit-organization developing open-source, open-access seismic risk assessment tools and data – called OpenQuake. With open initiatives gaining momentum in worldwide natural catastrophe (or NatCat) risk assessment and management, GEM’s approach is well placed to become the global standard – committed to key principles for public good, openness and transparency, collaboration and credibility. The GEM advantage By sponsoring GEM, Hannover Re instantly contributes to higher global goals in making the world more resilient to earthquakes. GEM’s full model transparency on data, assumptions and parameterizations perfectly meets the demand of new initiatives, governments, private markets and customers of Hannover Re. With access to GEM’s in-house expertise and state-of-the-art earthquake data and hazard/risk models, Hannover Re was able to develop better information for insurance pricing – effectively reducing the ‘protection gap’. In addition, benchmarking of existing vendor cat models against GEM at Hannover Re improved services for clients. To date, Hannover Re has developed aggregate earthquake risk models for Germany, Iran, Ecuador, Malaysia, Thailand and Singapore based on GEM OpenQuake. “Our partnership with GEM expanded in-house expertise on earthquake risk and strengthened our overall internal and external risk management processes. We are committed to continuing this productive collaboration in the years to come.” Jörg Steffensen. No images found. GALLERY 1/0 VIDEO RELATED CONTENTS

News Malaysian delegates visit GEM to explore future seismic hazard and risk assessment collaboration By: Apr 26, 2018 Share Facebook LinkedIn Malaysian delegates from the University of Technology Malaysia, University of Malaya and the Malaysia National Energy Company visited GEM’s headquarters in Pavia, Italy on 20th April to learn more about GEM’s earthquake analysis tools – OpenQuake/hazard and risk toolkits, current projects, and future plans and to explore potential areas for collaboration. Dr. Azlan Adnan of the University of Technology Malaysia led the delegation composed of Dr. Mohd Zamri, Dr. Hanafi Yusop, Dr. Zainul Mamat, Dr. Mushairry Mustaffar, Dr. Ramli Nazir and Dr. Mohd Nadzari Ismail. They expressed interest to learn more about GEM’s earthquake studies and to discuss further collaboration work. The delegates were also joined by Dr. Masyhur Irsyam of Indonesia Bandung University. GEM Secretary General, John Schneider and team leaders from hazard, risk, social vulnerability and information technology and development welcomed the delegates. Presentation of the OpenQuake features, current projects, and future plans highlighted the half-day meeting. No images found. GALLERY Add a Title Describe your image Add a Title Describe your image Add a Title Describe your image Add a Title Describe your image 1/12 VIDEO RELATED CONTENTS

News Linking Livelihood Resilience and Loss & Damage - Resilience Academy Capstone Conference 2017 By: Jul 2, 2018 Share Facebook LinkedIn About 40 experts in resilience, livelihoods and damage due to climate change came from Bangladesh, Colombia, Fiji, India, Germany, Netherlands, Philippines, Romania, Sri Lanka, Sweden, Switzerland, United States of America and the United Kingdom for the fourth Resilience Academy Capstone Conference in Washington, D.C. USA from 16-20 October. This year’s theme ‘Linking Livelihood Resilience and Loss & Damage’ is an emerging topic in climate change negotiations, research, policy and implementation of climate change action. The conference provided a platform for connecting communities of experts in various academic disciplines, practitioners, policy analysts and journalists. It was organized by the Munich Re Foundation, together with the Institute for Climate Change and Development in Bangladesh (ICCCAD), the Institute for Environment and Human Safety at the University of the United Nations (UNU-EHS) and the Woodrow Wilson Center for International Scholars (WWCIS)-Washington D.C., Diana Contreras, GEM Social Vulnerability and Resilience (SVR) team leader presented a case study: The fight of the Wayuu Community against the Drought in La Guajira – Colombia at the conference’s drought thematic session. The presentation focused on the consequences of the drought from 2012 to 2016 due to the El Niño phenomenon and unsustainable water management in the region experienced by the indigenous community Wayuu. Diana further demonstrated how the indicators and tools that were originally collected and designed to estimate social vulnerability (SV) due to earthquakes could be used to estimate SV due to climate change hazards such as drought. Based on the GEM’s tools used for the study, alternative sources of livelihood for the Wayuu indigenous community were identified as climate change adaptive capacity measures. “GEM believes in openness and transparency so all the social variables used in this analysis are publicly available for the scientific community at GEM’s Openquake platform website,” Diana emphasized at the end of the presentation. She further added that models for estimating SV in a given area could be developed using GEM’s Integrated Risk Modeling Toolkit (IRMT) accessible from the QGIS plugin library. No images found. GALLERY 1/0 VIDEO RELATED CONTENTS

News News Briefs December 2023: Institutional projects By: Dec 14, 2023 Dec 14, 2023 Share Facebook LinkedIn Institutional Projects SURA Project's Milestones The SURA project focused on enhancing OpenQuake's efficiency and developing a tailored rupture catalogue for Latin America. Improved computational efficiency now allows intricate risk calculations for vast regions with complex reinsurance schemes. Exporting loss curves based on Occurrence Exceedance Probability (OEP) and Aggregate Exceedance Probability (AEP) is now feasible. The curated rupture catalogue covers Chile, Colombia, Dominican Republic, Mexico, and Panama, ensuring consistent magnitude-frequency distributions and loss estimations across countries with different hazard models. Colombia's National Earthquake Risk Model GEM collaborates with the Colombian Geological Survey (SGC) and 11 universities to develop Colombia's National Earthquake Risk Model (MNRS). GEM leverages its experience in urban, national, and regional risk modelling using the OpenQuake engine. MNRS integrates detailed residential exposure models and vulnerability functions for representative building classes, developed by local experts. Expected in 2024, the model will feature public data on human impact, building damage, and economic losses for probabilistic risk and earthquake scenarios. Central America's PSHA Model Development GEM's work in the FORCE project focuses on developing a Probabilistic Seismic Hazard Assessment (PSHA) model for Central America. Key tasks involve developing datasets for seismic source characterisation, including a fault database derived from a block model encompassing the region. Advancements in homogenising the event catalogues and streamlining the workflow in the Modelling Building Toolkit (MBTK) are notable achievements within this initiative, aimed at enhancing seismic risk assessment capabilities in the region. FERMI: A Step Forward in Earthquake Source Modelling GEM's FERMI, replacing SHERIFS, revolutionises seismic hazard models' sub-fault to multi-fault earthquake source construction. Enhanced with superior performance and customisability, FERMI employs OQ-Engine functions, ensuring compatibility. In 2023, significant progress included a comprehensive system for enumerating potential multi-fault ruptures from a network, employing graph theory algorithms, while implementing filtering mechanisms based on plausibility for larger models. This breakthrough promises robust seismic modelling capabilities. No images found. GALLERY 1/0 VIDEO RELATED CONTENTS

News GEM’s Global Mosaic of Earthquake Models - challenges and approaches in creating globally consistent earthquake hazard and risk models By: Mar 16, 2022 Share Facebook LinkedIn On March 9, 2022, Marco Pagani and Anirudh Rao discussed GEM's approach in overcoming the top challenges in creating globally consistent earthquake hazard and risk models. The event, organized by EigenRisk, was part of the GEM-EigenRisk partnership to promote and distribute GEM’s global earthquake hazard products. On the hazard side, Marco discussed the challenges in creating a comprehensive map of seismic hazard by combining probabilistic seismic hazard models of many different nations and regions of the world. When GEM works on building a model for a certain region, we make sure to first get in touch with the community leaders. We try to engage them into those projects because we recognize the importance of working with local experts.” - Marco Pagani, GEM Hazard Coordinator on collaboration and openness in modeling earthquake hazards. On the risk side, Anirudh explained that the development of the global exposure model and building classification involved hundreds of people around the world, reaching out to communities through dozens of meetings and forming working groups. He also discussed the development of the global suite of vulnerability functions. He added that GEM visited different places, held workshops on earthquake risk assessment and solicited critical feedback from local experts. As a result, GEM was able to identify many areas for improvement in the risk models which, he said, would not have been possible without the deep engagement of local expertise and stakeholders. Both Marco and Anirudh expressed that community effort at various levels – an approach that GEM has embraced since its foundation in 2009 – was key in overcoming both scientific and organizational challenges in creating the global mosaic. Through sharing of scientific knowledge, material and human resources, GEM was able to produce the first globally consistent earthquake hazard and risk model in 2018. GEM’s open source software, OpenQuake Engine, was used to develop and translate all of the data and models into a consistent framework, resulting in hazard and risk maps that are now accessible to inform a wide range of risk management decisions, including risk rating, insurance underwriting, exposure modelling, catastrophe bonds/parametric risk financing, and seismic regulations. The webinar was participated in by more than 80 participants from several countries in the Americas, Asia and Europe. For more information about Eigenrisk and EigenPrism, visit www.eigenrisk.com . No images found. GALLERY 1/0 Gallery VIDEO RELATED CONTENTS

News Mapping COVID19 cases against earthquake risk By: May 21, 2020 Share Facebook LinkedIn GEM has been making contributions to COVID-19 disaster management as well as seeking ways to leverage GEM's work to benefit the disaster management community. To this date, GEM has provided social vulnerability data on the availability of hospital facilities and beds in Latin America (based on SARA and CCARA projects) at the request of the USAID office in Ecuador; and provided a (prepared by Helen Crowley-EUCENTRE and Vitor Silva-GEM) to support the World Bank assistance to Croatia following the Zagreb earthquake in March this year. “The COVID-19 emergency is a problem that affects most of the countries in the world and will continue, unfortunately, for many months. Many of these countries are also affected by seismic hazard and risk. There is a high probability that a seismic event will occur before the COVID-19 emergency is over,” says Mauro Dolce, GEM Governing Board Chair and General Scientific Advisor of the Italian Department of Civil Protection. He further adds that “This is a real case for which a multirisk approach is fundamental in addressing risk as demonstrated by a case in Europe, in Zagreb, Croatia, where a moderate earthquake resulted in a problematic management of COVID-19 cases and emergencies. Fortunately, the COVID-19 situation there was not severe.” “The combined risk of earthquakes and COVID-19 and the opportunity for GEM to contribute is very much in line with GEM’s current and ongoing programs.” John Schneider, GEM Secretary General shares GEM’s potential role in the initiative. The overlay of COVID-19 statistics over the GEM global earthquake risk map (2018) provides . “GEM is also working with the UNDRR Global Risk Assessment Framework to promote the development of methodologies to assess systemic and cascading risk to COVID-19, and to partner with developing countries to improve their ability to manage and reduce the overall risk to society.” AIR Worldwide, a founding GEM sponsor, has developed a COVID-19 Dashboard freely available for producing projections to the future development of infections and number of deaths by country. AIR has expanded their Model for Pandemics to reflect the actual crises. GEM is interested to further leverage its risk modelling tools and information to provide assistance to better understand and manage the global risk to COVID-19. If you would like more information on GEM’s exposure and vulnerability data or modelling capabilities, or have an interest in collaborating with GEM, please contact . No images found. GALLERY Covid-Seismic Risk map overlay Experimental COVID-19 and Global Seismic Risk Map (2020-05-20) Covid-Seismic Risk map overlay Experimental COVID-19 and Global Seismic Risk Map (2020-05-20) Covid-Seismic Risk map overlay Experimental COVID-19 and Global Seismic Risk Map (2020-05-20) 1/2 Gallery VIDEO RELATED CONTENTS

Back to Bangladesh Outcomes Bangladesh Liquefaction Hazard Assessment The section "Liquefaction susceptibility and hazard assessment" discusses the inclusion of regional liquefaction occurrence models in the project, which predict ground failure using existing mapped information and above-ground inferences of below-ground conditions. These models were used for the national scale liquefaction hazard assessment in the second phase of the project identifying the factors that contribute to liquefaction, the methods used for assessment, and the potential damage and losses that can result from liquefaction. Data Download Liquefaction OpenQuake Data Event-based Annual rate of liquefaction overlaid with road network.png Annual rate of liquefaction.png job_eb_sep.ini Maps-GIS sep_Bangladesh.gpkg Output sep_Bangladesh-annual rate-nonparametric.csv sep_Bangladesh-annual rate-parametric.csv Scenarios sc_1664_N_Bang/ sc_1762_arakan/ sc_1822/ sc_1869_cachar/ sc_1885_manikganj/ sc_1897_Dauki/ sc_1918_Srimangal/ sc_chittagong_north/ sc_chittagong_thrust_smaller/ sc_sikkim_mht/ sc_western_deformation_front/ sc_western_deformation_front_partial/ 1_scenario_files.ipynb Epicentre.csv rupture_trts.csv Explanatory variable - BNG.png gmmLT_ref/ gmpe_logic_tree_ascr.xml gmpe_logic_tree_subd.xml maps/ BGD_H3/ BGD_H3_L4.gpkg BGD_H3_L5.gpkg BGD_H3_L6.gpkg BGD_H3_L7.gpkg BGD_H3_L8.gpkg results/parametric scenario_1664.gpkg scenario_1762_Arakan.gpkg scenario_1822.gpkg scenario_1869_Cachar.gpkg scenario_1885_Manikganj.gpkg scenario_1897_Dauki.gpkg scenario_1918_Srimangal.gpkg scenario_Chittagong_north.gpkg scenario_Chittagong_thrust_smaller.gpkg scenario_Sikkim_mht.gpkg scenario_Western_deformation_front.gpkg scenario_Western_deformation_front_partial.gpkg Site_Model_Bangladesh.csv