Flooding in Nigeria and Ghana: opportunities for partnerships in disaster-risk reduction

ABSTRACT

Disasters annually ravage numerous African countries. Flooding is the most severe and prevalent adverse event and has serious implications for sustainable development. As the world is currently facing the COVID-19 pandemic, disasters such as flooding are still occurring but limited attention is being paid. This research analyzes the cause of flooding in Nigeria and Ghana, two countries regularly affected by floods. Previous analysis of the causes of flooding has mainly been done on a national scale. This work adopts a transnational approach by studying the flooding phenomena in both countries. It highlights an opportunity for international partnership in disaster-risk reduction (DRR) as both Nigeria and Ghana are signatories to the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction that advocates an understanding of disaster risk and aims to foster international cooperation. Appreciating the root causes of flooding is the first step in building awareness of the common problem that could be the foundation of seeking and adopting solutions. A systematic review of peer-reviewed papers was conducted. This study finds that the underlying drivers of flooding are similar in the two nations and advocates research and data-sharing as ways of partnering to tackle the common problem. This finding has the potential to promote and facilitate capacity building for DRR and flood-risk management (FRM). Potential solutions could also be scaled to other countries of comparable profiles facing related flooding challenges. This approach is likely to yield better and quicker results while presenting opportunities for partnership in achieving the United Nations 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development that has already suffered COVID-19-related setbacks.