Risk perception and disaster risk reduction actions

Another one of our junior researchers, Selina Maenzanise, finished her research last summer. After winning a funding grant from START, she worked in Namibia on an American Red Cross project (working closely with former RC Climate Centre program officer Lisette Braman). Her research tackles the perception of risk by community members in a flood-prone location, and the reasons why risk perception does not necessarily translate into disaster risk reduction (DRR) actions.

An excerpt from her thesis:

Even as household heads identified floods as a major concern, many are not implementing direct flood reduction actions such as sandbagging, elevating walls and entrances, flood-proofing houses etc., mostly because they lack familiarity/knowledge about these DRR aspects. This finding supports Hine et al (1986) quoted in Blake, 1999 that people implement DRR actions according to the confines of their knowledge about the disaster risk causes and risk reduction action strategies.

The Climate Centre would like to say thank you to Selina for all her hard work this summer, and the research she conducted!

For more information on Selina’s research, please contact davidse@climatecentre.org.