Participatory adaptation to climate extremes: an assessment of households’ willingness to contribute labor for flood risk mitigation in Pakistan Azhar Abbas, T. S. Amjath-Babu, Harald Kächele and Klaus Müller ABSTRACT The predicted increase in frequency and severity of flooding events poses substantial challenges for the farming communities of developing countries. Given the financial limitations of governments in these countries, the concept of participatory flood management is of high relevance. This article studies how communities can participate in structural measures such as embankments/dikes. Given that surplus rural labor is available due to the seasonal nature of agricultural operations, this paper utilizes a field survey for exploring the willingness to contribute (WTC) labor by rural households in Pakistan towards a hypothetical flood-protection scheme. Results show a potential labor contribution of 11.07 man-days per year per household (equivalent to Rs. 4,084 or 39 USD). The WTC decision is positively influenced by the number of adult family members, livestock damage, compensation received and expected effectiveness of the intervention, but is negatively influenced by age and education of the household head, farm income and the distance of the farm from the river. The study concludes that community resources (e.g., manual labor) can be utilized for flood mitigation, which may reduce the costs of building and maintaining the infrastructure while increasing the sense of security and ownership. This would also ensure the sustainability of flood protection interventions to a considerable extent. Azhar Abbas (corresponding author) T. S. Amjath-Babu Harald Kächele Klaus Müller Leibniz Centre for Agricultural Landscape Research (ZALF), Eberswalder Str. 84, Müncheberg 15374, Germany E-mail: azhar.abbas@zalf.de; azharuaf@gmail.com Azhar Abbas University of Agriculture, Faisalabad 38040, Pakistan Key words | adaptation, climate, Contingent Valuation Methodology, disaster, efficacy, intervention INTRODUCTION Extreme climate events like floods are projected to increase in frequency and intensity in the future (Hirabayashi et al. ). Despite several technological advancements, these events are causing significant physical destruction and econ- omic damage to societies (Coumou & Rahmstorf ; Kazi ). Fluvial flooding is a major type of flood disaster that inflicts large scale damages in developing countries, especially in South Asia, due to the presence of several major river systems (ICIMOD ) in the region. In addition, heavy reliance on conventional flood control prac- tices by these nations exacerbates the impacts of riverine floods (Shaw ). India, Bangladesh and Pakistan, three neighboring South Asian countries, have suffered heavily due to flooding disasters in last few decades. Despite a long history of flooding, a number of factors render these nations (especially Pakistan) less successful in devising sus- tainable solutions to manage these extreme events (Kale ). An important factor among them is the under-utiliz- ation of local knowledge and community resources like labor. Government bodies, international donor agencies and non-governmental organizations (NGOs) are investing size- able capital and energy in cushioning the impact of flooding disasters (both as ex-ante and ex-post) but the sustainability of these interventions still remains in question (Pearce ; ICIMOD ). It is surprising that the possibility of 621 © IWA Publishing 2016 Journal of Water and Climate Change | 07.3 | 2016 doi: 10.2166/wcc.2016.002 Downloaded from https://iwaponline.com/jwcc/article-pdf/7/3/621/373391/jwc0070621.pdf by guest on 12 July 2020