Integrating traditional and local knowledge into disaster risk reduction policies: Insights from Nepal, India and Bangladesh

Traditional and local knowledge (TLK) can be instrumental in mitigating the risks of disasters. There are calls to prioritize such knowledge to promote community resilience against disasters. This study examines the integration of TLK into disaster risk reduction (DRR) policies in Nepal, India and Bangladesh using a qualitative content analysis. We evaluated the level of integration in three components: policy priority, policy governance, and policy integration. Policy priority included five criteria and showed that India has better integrated TLK into national policies, followed by Nepal, and Bangladesh. None of the countries met our criteria for policy governance. Nepal and India emphasize community-based disaster management, combining traditional knowledge with modern technologies. However, policies are silent about the pathways of such integration, the governance mechanisms have no provision for community participation, nor are any integration tools proposed to promote such practices. Overall, the DRR policies have acknowledged the need to engage with TLK, but much more work is needed to prioritize TLK integration, which requires integration tools (e.g., legal, economic and institutional) and resources.