Abstract. The assessment of natural hazards such as floods and droughts is a complex issue demanding integrated approaches and high quality data. Especially in African developing countries, where information is limited, the assessment of floods and droughts, though an overarching issue influencing economic and social development, is even more challenging. This paper presents an integrated approach to assess crucial aspects of floods and droughts in the transboundary Mekrou River basin (a portion of the Niger basin in West Africa) combining climatic trends analysis and the findings of a household survey. The multi-variables trend analysis estimates at the biophysical level the climate variability and the occurrence of floods and droughts. These results are coupled with the analysis of household survey data that reveal behaviors and opinions of the local residents regarding the observed climate variability and occurrence of flood and drought events, household mitigation measures and impacts of floods and droughts. Furthermore, two econometric models are set up to estimate the costs of floods and droughts of impacted households during a two years period (2014–2015) resulting into an average cost of approximately 495 euro per household for floods and 391 euro per household for droughts.
Full paper:
https://www.nat-hazards-earth-syst-sci.net/18/1279/2018/
Citation: Markantonis, V., Farinosi, F., Dondeynaz, C., Ameztoy, I., Pastori, M., Marletta, L., Ali, A., and Carmona Moreno, C.: Assessing floods and droughts in the Mékrou River Basin (West Africa): A combined household survey and climatic trends analysis approach, Nat. Hazards Earth Syst. Sci., 18, 1279-1296, 2018 https://doi.org/10.5194/nhess-18-1279-2018