The biggest humanitarian catastrophe was Typhoon Haiyan in the Philippines in November; 7,500 people died or went missing and more than 4m were made homeless.
Storms are likely to become more severe say scientists, raising the prospect of future catastrophes like typhoon Haiyan, which left more than 6,000 dead in 2013.
The Japanese are no strangers to catastrophe — earthquakes, typhoons, mudslides and other natural disasters routinely batter this archipelago, which is smaller in land area than California but is home to nearly four times as many people.
In the aftermath of natural disasters or other large-scale catastrophes - Typhoon Haiyan in the Philippines and the Ebola quarantines in West Africa come to mind - ChildFund regularly sets up "child-centered spaces," safe zones where we can not only tend to children's basic health and nutritional needs, but also ensure that they are in an environment that is conducive to play.
The Pope said as soon as he saw the catastrophe caused by the typhoon, he had decided to go to the Philippines.
Five days after one of the worst typhoons on record hit the Philippines, the magnitude of the catastrophe is barely captured in the preliminary statistics: nearly 2,000 people listed as dead and many thousands more missing; more than 600,000 people displaced; countless homes and roads crushed by surging water.
Haiyan was the third time that catastrophe struck in the Philippines in less than a year: in August, another typhoon resulted in huge flooding on the island of Luzon.
At the Warsaw climate talks, which started just three days after Haiyan hit the coast, the Philippines' UN representative Yeb Sano captured the attention of the world as he pleaded with leaders to attend to the catastrophe in his homeland and act to "prevent a future where super typhoons become a way of life".
If a major typhoon was to strike the areas devastated by Haiyan again in the near future, there is the potential for catastrophe, said Alison Kent, Oxfam's humanitarian policy advisor in the Philippines.
In addition to capital gains and an accounting charge, latest fourth-quarter results include catastrophe losses of $170.5 million, or 7 cents per share, related to the tsunami, hurricanes, earthquake and typhoons.
