Strengthening Resilience to Fire Disasters through Community Participation in Gikomba Market, Nairobi City County, Kenya

Abstract

Fire disasters accounts for 20% of the total disaster in Kenya, with direct property loss estimated at USD 595,715 From 2014 to 2022, a total of 248 fire incidences were reported in Nairobi, about 30 of which occurred in the Gikomba market. Contribution of community in disaster risk mangenet can never be overlooked in disaster resilience building. Even though the concept of multi-stakeholder has been adopted in Kenya, the community's involvement in disaster risk management has always been passive. Therefore, the objective of the study was to determine how the level of fire risk awareness by the Gikomba community affects their participation in disasters risk management. This study was guided by the model of Sense of Community Responsibility (SOCR), Rocha’s community empowerment model, and the theory of margin. A mixed research design was adopted in the study. A stratified random sample was obtained by dividing the Gikomba market population into several homogenous and non-overlapping strata based on the nature of the business. Open-ended questionnaires were administered to collect quantitative data from 384 respondents. On the other hand, the no-probability sampling technique was used through purposive snowball sampling to collect qualitative data through interviews. Key informants were mainly disaster experts drawn from, national, county, and private stakeholders. Quantitative data was analyzed through SPSS (version 26) software, while qualitative data was organized into meaningful and reasonable units that were coded using words or short phrases. The study established that level of community understanding of their involvement in disaster risk management was low since 52% of the respondents believed that disaster risk reduction was the sole duty of the national government or county governments. Therefore, this study recommends that, both national and county governments enact and implement laws that will enhance community participation in disaster risk management programs as part of the stakeholder group in line with the existing multiagency concept of operation. Further disaster risk awareness should be integrated into school curricula to improve disaster awareness at the local level.