Spatial-Temporal Relations of Flood Risk and Its Potential Dynamic Pressures in Myanmar

Abstract

Despite multiple challenges, floods remain the most frequently occurring hazard in Myanmar. Current developments of political instability, multidimensional insecurity, and associated economic crisis have burdened the existing vulnerabilities and inequalities of the Burmese people and their ecosystems. Diminishing adaptive capacities of degraded ecosystems, poor infrastructure, and extreme poverty, together with major livelihood dependency on climate-sensitive agriculture, will further increase flood risk. Moreover, other hazards such as COVID-19, heatwaves, and droughts may exacerbate flood impacts leading to compound disasters. Understanding how and which factors drive flood risk, and where they distribute are important to reduce flood risk, address its root causes, and prevent future flood damages by lessening exposures, vulnerabilities, and even hazards. We aim to compare the spatial-temporal distributions between dynamic pressures and flood risk, and identify the spatial relations on a national scale and within floodplains. We draw on socio-ecological risk assessment, systematic review, time-series analysis and modified t-test after testing spatial auto-correlations of dynamic pressures and flood risk. Our results show that many socio-ecological dynamic pressures driven by economic- and governance-related root causes had positive spatial relationships with flood risks. We recommend effective land use and environmental governance that consider compound and cascaded flood risk and investment in public services and infrastructure such as health and education to reduce vulnerabilities and increase resilience of Myanmar people.