Community responses to the annual flooding (efundja) in the Cuvelai-Etosha basin, Northern Namibia

Abstract

The efundja is the annual flooding experienced in the Cuvelai-Etosha basin of northern Namibia. This recurring flooding varies in intensity and impact the lives of the inhabitants of the basin in disparate ways. The rural population of the basin is especially vulnerable to the impacts associated with these floods.The governmental response to the efundja is mostly reactive, and the voices of the rural community are lacking in the development and execution of the disaster response strategy for the area. Limited studies exist to include the voices of rural communities in the narrative about the efundja and its impact and mitigation.This study used focus group discussions to investigate the experiences of heads of households in the affected rural communities in the study area to address this hiatus in the research. The results of the study can also aid in addressing the deficiencies in the governmental response strategy used to deal with the floods.Rural communities in the study area articulated the impacts of the efundja on their lives well and indicated that the impacts are pervasive and affect their entire way of life. They reported that the nature and duration of the efundja have changed over time, with a longer duration, more severe impacts, pollution, and poor water quality associated with recent efundja events. They attribute this mainly to climate change, an increase in the population of the basin, inappropriate human behavior and bad spatial planning. Although the rural communities reported various practical methods to alleviate the adverse impacts of the flooding, they expressed a general lack of capacity to deal with the flooding effectively. Empowerment through education and training on how to mitigate effects and participation in disaster response planning and execution were affirmed needs in the communities surveyed.The research and its results can be used to inform a better disaster response strategy for northern Namibia. The study can also be emulated in other areas of the Global South. The results of such studies can be compared with that of the present study to expand the disaster response narrative. Adding the voices of vulnerable rural communities can be a particularly valuable addition to the disaster response narrative since their views are sometimes excluded in disaster response studies.