Djibouti, Africa | Floods - Simplified Early Action Protocol (MDRDJ009)

Country: Djibouti Source: International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies Please refer to the attached file. RISK ANALYSIS Prioritized hazard and its historical impact The vast majority of Djibouti’s rural population is highly susceptible to climatic uncertainty – they live in deserts or marginal and infertile areas, often with highly erodible soils, poor ground cover, and limited water supplies where food security is a serious concern. The major hazards in Djibouti are floods, droughts, sea level rise, and epidemics, whose frequency, occurrence, and impacts have increased in recent years, already pose a significant risk to the country’s vulnerable population. As shown in the table below floods and drought are the two main hazards affecting Djibouti. This revised simplified EAP will address floods mainly as result of flash floods and seasonal rivers and run off from hills forming stream in the basement valleys and later on, based on this experience, the National Society will consider working on a drought simplified EAP. Floods is one of the exacerbated hazard effects of global climate change and Djibouti is at risk to both flash floods due to topographic nature of its landscape of volcanic formations and seasonal riverbeds and tributaries draining to the ocean as well as oceanic effects of climate change including sea level rise, floods and relative Tsunamis making Djibouti one of the non-island high risk countries. These features contribute to the vulnerability and exposure of Djibouti to increased intensity floods in the event of heavy rains. In 2021 the World Bank carried out 40 years comparative trend analysis for different hazards, illustrated in the graph below which shows floods has a high effect in terms population affected in Djibouti followed by drought. The mean annual precipitation is 244.6 millimetres (mm), with highest rainfall occurring July to September, but flash floods events have been experienced outside of this season like the case of the flash floods in November 2019 when the National Society requested DREF funding to supported the affected population. Djibouti has somewhat highly variable rainfall, however the country is expected to experience an increase in the occurrence and intensity of heavy rainfall events, increasing risks of floods as well as likely resulting in increases in the intensity and frequency of dry periods and water scarcity. An estimated 33% of the population lives in high hazard risk zones and 35% of the economy is chronically vulnerable to floods and drought.1 In Djibouti, floods and droughts are expected to occur more frequently in coastal as well as inland areas, with urban centres around the coast at risk of flooding. The Djibouti Red Crescent from experience estimates on average about 30,000 people are annually affected by adverse effects of floods with the peak realised in 2019 where 250,000 people were affected.

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