Learning from the past: common sense, traditional wisdom, and technology for flood risk reduction developed in Japan

• Published in: Regional environmental change Vol. 21; no. 3
• Main Authors: Itsukushima, Rei, Ohtsuki, Kazuaki, Sato, Tatsuro
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Berlin/Heidelberg Springer Berlin Heidelberg 01-09-2021; Springer; Springer Nature B.V
• Subjects: Climate Change; Climate Change/Climate Change Impacts; Control systems; Dam engineering; Damage prevention; Earth and Environmental Science; Economic impact; Environment; Environmental risk; Flood control; Flood damage; Flooding; Floodplains; Floods; Geography; Global temperature changes; Hydrologic cycle; Hydrology; Levees; Nature Conservation; Oceanography; Pumping stations; Regional/Spatial Science; Review; Risk management; Risk reduction; Rivers; System effectiveness; Microtopography; Flood management; Land use; Traditional knowledge; River basin management
• ISSN: 1436-3798; 1436-378X
• DOI: 10.1007/s10113-021-01820-z

Floods cause severe damage in terms of human and economic loss on a global scale. Moreover, the risk of flooding is increasing owing to a hydrological cycle intensified by climate change and by the concentration of population in cities vulnerable to flooding. Although conventional river-engineering structures, including continuous levees, flood-control dams, and drainage pump stations, have been installed in many countries to prevent flood damage, these measures are vulnerable to the large-scale floods that exceed the design level of the flood-control infrastructure. In contrast, traditional strategies and flood-control technology that has been used since ancient times allow inundation and instead strive to minimize flood damage in floodplains. Nevertheless, the onslaught of modern river-engineering methods means that traditional flood-control systems have been rapidly disappearing, with the concomitant decrease in floodplain inundation frequency. This paper reviews the current knowledge about traditional flood-control systems that are sustainable and provide effective flood countermeasures against future uncertainties. Furthermore, we describe the problems and solutions associated with the integration of traditional flood-control systems and conventional river-engineering methods to decrease flood damage in floodplains.