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An analysis of small business’ flood mitigation behaviour in Kampala, Uganda

Veeravalli, Sai Ganesh (2020) An analysis of small business’ flood mitigation behaviour in Kampala, Uganda.

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Abstract:Kampala faces frequent floods, which affects both livelihoods and businesses. In Kampala, both formal and informal businesses contribute about 60% of national tax revenue, mostly stacked by small businesses providing big chunk of employment opportunities. Though there is enormous potential for small business to thrive in Kampala, environmental problems like flooding is a huge obstruction for their growth. Understanding how businesses perceive flood risk and what factors influence their mitigation behaviour can be helpful in designing interventions or policies that enhance mitigation efforts of businesses. Available literature did not explore much in businesses mitigation behaviour and is scanty in a developing world context. The aim of this research is to understand the flood mitigation behaviour of MSME’s and find the most influential factors affecting it in three selected neighbourhoods of Kampala, Uganda. The survey data collected in August 2017 by Mr. Simbarashe Chereni as part of an ongoing Ph.D. study at the University of Twente is used in this research. The semi-structured questionnaire is designed to capture information regarding business characteristics, perceptions, flood experience, risk attitudes, government efforts, and mitigation measures implemented by businesses. An extended version of Protection Motivation Framework (PMT) is proposed in this research with variables that relevant to businesses based on the existing literature. Correlation and regression analysis were used to establish a relationship between the extended PMT framework variables and the flood migration behaviour of businesses. The study established a significant correlation between business size; tenure status; business age; past flood induced financial impact; future flood likelihood; willingness to spend on mitigation measures on one hand and mitigation behaviour on other. Structural measures are the most common measures implemented by businesses irrespective of their size, location, tenure status, type, age, willingness and flood experience. Rebuilding/raising the floor and clearing drainage are the two structural measures about which the businesses are really positive regarding their effectiveness and ease of self-implementation. Awareness regarding the relatively low cost non-structural measures should be enhanced among businesses as very few adopted non-structural measures and only one-third of businesses expressed them as very effective measures. The responses to the question on future flood likelihood showed most of the businesses are not aware of future flood risks irrespective of their size. It is important to educate businesses about the risk of future floods and the impact it could cause to their businesses. The results also showed poor information seeking behaviour among businesses and community leaders, NGO’s & CBO’s should find more efficient ways of information dissemination regarding floods. The results of this research showed that not all findings of the existing literature which are based on formal businesses in a developed world context can be transferred to a developing world context such as Kampala with high levels of informality. The regression model based on the proposed extended PMT framework explained more variance in the mitigation behaviour of businesses compared to the original PMT framework though not all variables made a significant contribution to the model.
Item Type:Essay (Master)
Faculty:ITC: Faculty of Geo-information Science and Earth Observation
Programme:Geoinformation Science and Earth Observation MSc (75014)
Link to this item:https://purl.utwente.nl/essays/85239
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