Assessment of household-level adaptation strategy to flood in East Coast Malaysia

Abstract

The increase of flood-related event has affected not only property damage but also casualties among the community that lives in a flood-prone area. Increasing risk of exposure to the flood-related event will consequently affect the livelihoods of a community. Therefore, the adaptive capacity of a community is vital for farmers to be resilient in any disaster or risk-related situation. Thus, this study will determine a household-level adaptation strategy to flood on the east coast of Malaysia by using the assessment of the Livelihood Vulnerability Index (LVI). 100 paddy farmers living in Kota Bharu Kelantan were chosen as the respondents and the analysis of this study focuses on the adaptive capacity of the respondents. Indicators such as sociodemographic profile, livelihood strategies, and social network is used to assess farmers’ vulnerability and their adaptation capacity. Overall finding of the study shows that the paddy farmers’ household is in less vulnerable to flood events (0.36813). The result shows that social network (0.5275) is the least indicator to have higher adaptive capacity compared to indicators like livelihood strategies (0.3883) and sociodemographic profile (0.3485). The element of adaptive capacity is crucial to increase household resilience as well as to sustain the need of a household and decrease their vulnerability to a natural disaster such as flood. Therefore, assistance from the government and non-government agencies is needed to assist and support this community to promote well-being and quality of life.