Community-Based Flood Resilience Strategies for Mitigating the Effect of Flooding in the Orashi Region of Rivers State

The study examined community-based flood resilience strategies for mitigating the effect of flooding in the Orashi region of Rivers State. Four objectives and four research questions guided the study. The descriptive survey research design was adopted in the study with a population of 1,350 community leaders in Abua-Odual, Ahoada East, Ahoada West, and Ogba-Egbema-Ndoni Local Government Areas and environmental experts in public universities in Rivers State. This comprised 1,305 leaders and 45 environmental experts in the study area. The sample size of this study was 342 respondents comprising 297 community leaders and 45 environmental experts in Abua-Odual, Ahoada East, Ahoada West, and Ogba-Egbema-Ndoni Local Government Areas of Rivers State. The multistage sampling technique was adopted in selecting the sample. The instruments for data collection were a structured questionnaire titled “Community-Based Flood Resilience Strategies for Mitigating the Effect of Flooding Questionnaire” and an interview schedule. The instruments were validated by three experts, while the reliability of the instrument was established through a test of internal consistency using Cronbach Alpha method. Coefficients of 0.86, 0.81, 0.71 and 0.89 were obtained for the various clusters of the instrument which showed that the instrument was reliable. The research questions of the study were answered using mean and standard deviation while the hypotheses were tested using z-test statistics at 0.05 level of significance. The qualitative data were also analysed using thematic analysis. The findings of the study revealed among others that the level of prevalence of flooding in Orashi region of Rivers State is high and community-based early warning systems and disaster response teams could be used for mitigating the effect of flooding in the Orashi region of Rivers State to a high extent. Based on the findings of the study, it was recommended among others that the government and relevant agencies should invest in modern hydrological monitoring equipment, establish flood gauging stations at strategic locations, and develop real-time data collection systems. This infrastructure should be complemented by regular vulnerability assessments and flood impact studies to better understand the magnitude, frequency, and consequences of flooding in the region.