Local knowledge as key factor for implementing nature-based solutions for flood risk mitigation

A tension between a scientific «expert» knowledge and a «traditional» local knowledge has always crossed Disaster Risk Reduction policies and practices. Big detention basins or large engineering works are usually preferred by delegated agencies for flood risk mitigation measures based on scientific hydraulic models. Due to economic or geo-morphological reasons these solutions can't be always implemented, and so challenging «traditional» cost-benefit analysis. This was the case of a six-year project called Rural Sustainable Drainage System (RSUDS), led since 2014 by the local government of Stroud, a village in South West England. Following the 2007 major floods occurred in England, four action groups were formed in the study site to demand for further flood risk mitigation measures. Due to the inefficiency of the engineering solutions proposed, which consisted of two large ponds working as detention basins, the bottom-up process resulted in the implementation of nature-based solutions c...

In the last decade, there has been a growing interest in the role of knowledge in disaster risk reduction: in Disaster Studies, in the public debate following major events, and in International Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR) policies (e.g. the 2005 Hyogo Framework and the 2015 Sendai Framework). «Local knowledge» has been often brought into the debate as a way to use knowledge in a more effective way (Shaw et al. 2009; Gaillard, Mercer 2012; McEwen, Jones 2012; Hiwasaki et al. 2014), while usually underestimated, misinterpreted or little acknowledged. From the policy level, the 2007 EU Floods Directive theoretically built a common European scenario for flood risk management, providing a common flood risk governance perspective, which can give the opportunity to include different knowledges and actors into Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR) policies and practices across Europe (Krieger 2013; Alexander et al. 2016). Within this convergence, flood risk works as a relevant research object to explore because it is often deemed by environmental scientist as a «known risk», but paradoxically floods are the most frequently experienced disasters in Europe (Barredo 2009)