Flood to Flourish

While flood risk managers across Australia recognise the importance of community members’ shared responsibility in reducing risk and strengthening resilience, in practice community engagement in flood risk management remains limited. This is partially due to a lack of knowledge and evidence on how to achieve this in ways that work for both agencies and communities.

Flood risk managers are looking to continuously improve their practice to better engage with local experiences, needs and capacities that determine community vulnerability and resilience. Flood risk management will be more effective and better accepted when community values, knowledge and priorities for resilience solutions are incorporated.

MSDI Water received funding from the Australian Government as a part of the Disaster Ready Fund Round Two to undertake Flood to Flourish, a project that will co-design flood risk management solutions and resilience practices with partner communities, including residents, Traditional Owners, local governments, floodplain managers, industry and other stakeholders. This includes the development of  methods and tools that enable these groups to collaboratively engage and build resilience capabilities and networks, develop a shared understanding of risk, explore risk tolerance, identify priorities and co-develop risk management and resilience solutions.

This funding is for the first stage of this project, which is focused on establishing trusted relationships in partner communities, co-designing and starting to test prototype methods and tools and confirming their applicability in flood-prone communities across Australia.

This project leverages the work across Monash’s Fire to Flourish program, led by MSDI. Fire to Flourish and MSDI Water are demonstrating the important and brave work universities can do to catalyse mission-oriented, challenge-led research initiatives that make a difference.