Towards an Anticipatory and Localized Humanitarian Response: Findings of community consultations on flooding in Maban, South Sudan

In December 2022, a team of researchers of the Rift Valley Institute and Save the Children Denmark conducted consultations on flooding with communities in Maban County, Upper Nile State, South Sudan. The main goal of the consultations was to discuss with community members the ways in which recent largescale flooding affected their lives, and what anticipatory action measures could be taken before the next rainy season.

Key findings include:

• There are no historical precedents to the magnitude of flooding that has affected Maban since 2019. As a result, communities were overwhelmed as they lacked intergenerational knowledge that they could use to cope with flooding.
• There has been a perceptible gap in community engagement and coordination between local government, humanitarian actors, and communities in response to floods. These gaps need to be urgently addressed before the next rainy season.
• Most discussions on preventive measures over the past four years have been monopolized by the need to construct a 25-kilometer dike along the Yabus River. While the need for largescale mitigation is evident, the focus on the dike was done at the expense of more tangible anticipatory action measures that would have helped people cope with floods.
• Existing community organizations are the natural candidates to lead community owned anticipatory action and should be empowered.
• Although the provision of services came to a near total standstill as a result of floods, logistical coordination between a few humanitarian agencies permitted the continuity of some services. These initiatives can be used as examples towards more systemic coordination between humanitarian agencies ahead of the next rainy season.