Linking rural community livelihoods to resilience building in flood risk reduction in Zimbabwe

Abstract

KEYWORDS

Enhancing climate governance through indigenous knowledge: Case in sustainability science

“…Whenever a response to climatic events such as floods and drought is called for, users of IK are flexible to actively choose available coping and adaptive options for climate proofing. Although not clearly referring to the concept of climate governance in their arguments, Gwimbi 10 , Mawere et al 42 and Chanza 44,45 write about the significance of IK in mitigating the negative effects of climate change such as floods, violent storms, dry spells and drought. …”

“…[5][6][7] The disaster management community is also drawing heavily from the experiences of indigenous people with the view of making impacting risk and disaster management interventions. [8][9][10][11][12] Evidence of IK's usefulness in climate science ranges from enhancing understanding of climate impacts, [13][14][15] particularly at local scale where scientifically advanced models tend to give a coarse-grained focus, 16 to informing successful mitigation and adaptation interventions 13,[17][18][19] whose success could be credited on meaningful community participation in identifying appropriate climate projects. 15,[20][21][22] A demonstration of the climate governance-IK linkages is given in this paper.…”

Looking back and looking forward: Exploring livelihood change and resilience building in a Brazilian coastal community

“…Resilience theory offers a vision of sustainability (Berkes and Seixas, 2005), and this concept embraces change as a basic feature of the way systems work and develop, and therefore is especially appropriate in times when changes are a prominent feature (Chapin et al, 2009). A few studies have attempted to link livelihood approaches and social-ecological resilience (Marschke and Berkes, 2006;Knutsson and Ostwald, 2006;Gwimbi, 2009;Sallu et al, 2010;Hanazaki et al, 2013;Goulden et al, 2013). An important factor in assessing resilience is analyzing the way in which livelihoods change over time, in response to various drivers (Vaitla et al, 2012).…”

Assessing Resilience in Stressed Watersheds

“…Social resilience is the capacity of social systems, such as communities, to withstand and adapt to disturbances that result from social, political, or environmental changes (Adger 2000). Enhancing and maintaining resilience is increasingly identified as a management goal or strategy for projects focused on either ecosystems (e.g., Kareiva et al 2008, Benson and Garmestani 2011, Sierra Club 2012, WWF 2012 or social systems (e.g., Godschalk 2003, Norris et al 2008, Gwimbi 2009, Longstaff et al 2010). However, a holistic systems approach to management that considers the components of both ecological and social resilience can be more effective in managing complex feedbacks and planning for change than treating resources as being entirely contained within either an ecosystem or a social system (Berkes and Folke 1998).…”

“…A resilience assessment that identifies key issues and system drivers and evaluates the past and current level of resilience (Walker et al 2009, Resilience Alliance 2010 represents an important first step in holistically managing for a resilient system. Although several frameworks have been proposed for conducting resilience assessments (e.g., Walker et al 2002, 2009, Resilience Alliance 2007, the application of these techniques to realworld systems continues to be a challenge because of the highly dynamic and multidimensional nature of linked SESs Folke 1998, Walker et al 2002). In addition, although some practitioners may find these or similar frameworks to be useful and appropriate (see Resilience Alliance 2013 for some case studies), others may want to conduct a resilience assessment but lack sufficient time or information to use the often detailed and time-consuming approaches inherent in existing frameworks.…”