Prioritizing interventions to reduce seismic vulnerability in school facilities in Colombia

Colombian seismic code NSR-98 establishes the requirement for t he seismic vulnerability analysis and, if necessary, the strengthening of public facilities (schools). Due to the investments required by risk reduction pr ograms, it is necessary to establish criteria for assigning priorities for th e interventions. This article proposes a methodology for obtaining a Benefit-Cost Rat io (BCR) at the subnational level, by assessing the expected annual average los s of the built area of public schools and the retrofitting cost. The BCR is estimat ed as the difference between the estimates of the net present value for status quo a nd retrofitted states, these two divided by the retrofitting costs. According to the B CR, 47.3% of the total school built area of Colombia should be retrofitted where the retrofitting costs correspond to 25% of the total investment. Proposed BCR i s useful for prioritizing regions in functi on of the feasibility of reducing the seismic vulnerability of the schools.Peer Reviewe