Back to news
10 Jul 2018 | CBFEWS

Local Communities Take Ownership of Flood Early Warning System

At the onset of the 2018 monsoon, a community in Shrikhandi Bhittamore in Bihar, India, raised funds to repair a community-based flood early warning system (CBFEWS) that had been damaged along the Ratu River near the Nepal–India border. The funds were raised by Yuganter, a local NGO, and community representatives led by the Mukhiya of Shrikhandi, Purnima Mishra. The system was repaired by International Centre for Integrated Mountain Development (ICIMOD) and Sustainable Eco Engineering (SEE), in partnership with Yuganter.

0 mins Read

70% Complete
A team from SEE restoring the system in Shrikhandi Bhittamore

ICIMOD, partners, and local governments have come together to save lives from flash flooding by installing eleven such community-based flood early warning systems (CBFEWS) in nine tributaries of the Bramhaputra, Indus, and Koshi rivers in Afghanistan, India, Nepal, and Pakistan.

A CBFEWS provides at least four hours of lead time for vulnerable communities to respond to approaching floods. The systems, which rely on technology and human operators, have saved lives and property and established goodwill between upstream and downstream communities otherwise unknown to each other. During the 2017 monsoon floods, CBFEWS helped save 17 children on along the Koshi River, in Nepal and India.


A Yuganter representative handing over the amount to SEE-ICIMOD representatives as Purnima Mishra observes

Stay current

Stay up to date on what’s happening around the HKH with our most recent publications and find out how you can help by subscribing to our mailing list.

Sign Up

Related content

Continue exploring this topic

Third UIBN–AC Meeting discusses data gaps in Upper Indus basin research

The UIBN–AC Meeting was primarily held to recap previous meetings, discuss the progress made by the country chapter’s Technical Working ...

10 Jan 2019 RMS
RMS to facilitate uptake of solutions for resilience building in the HKH

The HKH is undergoing significant changes. Recognizing these changes and building resilience is key to safeguarding livelihoods in rural mountain ...

9 Feb 2016 Wetlands
Water Flow and Koshi Ecosystems

A two-day consultative workshop was held 4 February in Kathmandu to understand the con-nection between water flow and ecology in ...

Brick sector partnership enhances state of knowledge on science, technology, and policy in Nepal and South Asia

The project conducted interactive trainings and workshops, solicited feedback from the FNBI’s member associations for increased ownership, and mobilized local ...

22 Mar 2015 News
The Himalayan waters: complex challenges and regional solutions

It is difficult to think of a resource more essential to the wellbeing of people and their economies than water, ...

9 Sep 2016 HICAP
Outscaling community-based flood early warning systems in Assam

Every year, monsoon precipitation results in floods of various magnitudes inundating large areas of the Ganges, Brahmaputra, and Indus basins ...

30 Sep 2016 News
HKH Researchers Convene “Writeshop” to Bring HIMAP Assessment to Reality

More than 50 researchers from institutions around the world convened in Dhulikhel, Nepal, this week to make a major push ...

5 Jun 2015 News
World Environment Day 2015: ‘Sustainable consumption and production’

ICIMOD celebrated World Environment Day 2015 in collaboration with the Government of Gilgit Baltistan, the Pakistan Agricultural Research ...