Local People’s Responses to Flood Disasters in Flood Prone Areas of Northeast Bangladesh

Abstract

In the flood prone areas of Bangladesh, local people have adapted to flooding. Essentially, properties are protected against flooding by constructing villages in the highlands on natural levees, while using lowlands as agricultural fields during the dry season. It remains to spread flood inundation condition and exempts the necessity of strengthening measures against flooding. This study aims to clarify the status of self, community, and public assistance for flood disasters in flood prone areas of Northeast Bangladesh based on a questionnaire survey. We extracted similarities and differences between local people’s flood responses by comparing our findings to those of a similar study on a 2006 flood in the Sendai River Basin, Japan. The effects of preventive flood mitigation measures such as selection of house location are quantitatively confirmed. Maximum inundation depth and duration for houses is approximately 10% less than that for agricultural fields. The study reveals that both areas have evacuation activities, although factors motivating evacuation differ.