Measuring community disaster resilience for sustainable climate change adaptation: Lessons from time-series findings in rural Cambodia

Abstract

Donor-funded climate and disaster resilience programmes and projects aim to help build the capacities and resilience of communities. Measuring resilience is critical, therefore, in providing feedback, evidence, and accountability. This paper presents recent two-year time-series findings from an ongoing multi-partner academic and practical collaboration pertaining to a climate change adaption project with rural communities in Cambodia. To measure community resilience, the study used the Flood Resilience Measurement for Communities, which measures, using mixed methods, disaster resilience capacities across five key dimensions of resilience: human, social, physical, natural, and financial capitals. The study analysed and reported changes in these areas of resilience in the selected villages, generating insights into the strengths and weaknesses of flood resilience capacities in the region. This paper provides valuable guidance as to where investment can be most effective in different communities, confirming the usefulness of the tool in measuring resilience and assessing the effectiveness of the project concerned.