Urban flooding poses a 
serious challenge to development and the lives of people, particularly the residents of the rapidly expanding towns and cities in developing countries. In order to promote learning among key stakeholders on how to strengthen urban resilience, the World Bank published a new guidebook titled Cities and Flooding: A Guide to Integrated Urban Flood Risk Management for the 21st Century. This document, prepared with the financial support of the Global Facility for Disaster Reduction and Recovery (GFDRR), embodies the state-of-the art on integrated urban flood risk management.
The Guide serves as a primer for decision and policy makers, technical specialists, central, regional and local government officials, concerned stakeholders in the community sector, civil society and non-governmental organizations, and the private sector. It includes specific tools and guidelines, as well as case studies and examples from cities in the East Asia and the Pacific region that are especially vulnerable to flooding in the face of long-term climate change trends.
The guidebook provides forward-looking operational guidance on how to manage the risk of floods in a transforming urban environment and changeable climate. It argues for a strategic approach, in which appropriate measures are identified, assessed, selected and integrated in a process that both involves and informs the full range of stakeholders. This integrated approach includes: the construction of drainage channels, incorporating “urban greening” such as wetlands and environmental buffers; the creation of flood warning systems; and improved land planning to counter the effects of potential flooding. The guidebook also advocates for a more cohesive information dissemination system involving web-based flood reports and accessibility to hydrological and hydro-meteorological data and for cooperation from various sectors of government, the public sector, civil society, and other organizations.
The Guide is supported by a website: http://www.gfdrr.org/gfdrr/urbanfloods. The website aims to form a platform for practitioners for dialog around the Guide’s themes and content as well as a vehicle for dissemination of the Guide. The website contains additional resources related to the content of the Guide.
For further information please visit: http://www.gfdrr.org/gfdrr/node/1037.
Cities and Flooding: A Guide to Integrated Urban Flood Risk Management for the 21st Century.
