Until the mid-1990's, systematic information about the occurrence of disasters of small and medium impact and dissagregated data about the effects of large scale disasters was not available in most countries in the world.

From 1994, the creation of a common conceptual and methodological framework was begun in latin America by groups of researchers, academicians, and institutional actors linked to the Network of Social Studies in the Prevention of Disasters in Latin America (Red de Estudios Sociales en Prevención de Desastres en América Latina - LA RED).

These groups conceptualised a system of acquisition, collection, retrieval, query and analyis of information about disasters of small, medium and greater impact, based on pre-existing official data, academic records, newspaper sources and institutional reports in nine countries in Latin America. This effort was then picked up by UNDP who sponsored the implementation of similar systems in the Caribbean, Asia and Africa. The developed conceptualisation, methodology and software tool is called Disaster Inventory System - DesInventar (Sistema de Inventario de Desastres).

The development of DesInventar, with its conception that makes visible disasters from a local scale (town or equivalent), facilitates dialogue for risk management between actors, institutions, sectors, provincial and national governments.

DesInventar is a conceptual and methodological tool for the implementation of National Disaster Observatories and the construction of databases of damage, losses and in general the effects of disasters. It includes:

• Data Collection Methodology (definitions and how to's)
• Data Analysis Methodology (how to obtain results)
• A Database with flexible structure
• Free, open-source software to manage the system, including multi-user, remote data entry and data querying, reporting and analysis (not limited to a predefined number of reports)