COST-Action LAND4FLOOD – Challenges for flood protection in river catchments

An international group of researchers around Prof. Jiřina Jílková and Prof. Lenka Slavíková from the University of Ústí nad Labem (Czech Republic) and Prof. Thomas Hartmann from Utrecht University will investigate and promote collaborations to topics of flood retention on private land in different European countries.

Picture: fotolia, © mb67

The COST-Action LAND4FLOOD addresses flood protection measures, that go along grey infrastructure, i.e. dikes. As a complement to them, nature-based green infrastructure solutions such as Natural Water Retention Measures (NWRM) are promising options to mitigate flood – but claim more land than traditional methods. Mobilizing private land for temporary flood storage means coordinating different actors and institutions in water management, essentially including landowners in management plans. Agreements which include new forms of temporal and spatial land use need to be supported, and also embedded in communication and negotiation strategies. To foster the implementation of green infrastructure options on private land, there is a need to find and implement ways to better connect academic interdisciplinary knowledge with real world policy formulation and decision-making.

The focus of the Action lies on the promotion of an inter- and transdisciplinary understanding of land for flood risk management and an increased actor involvement. This will be addressed in three working groups concerning retention and flows (catchment-scale hydrology), land (property rights and land use) and instruments to mobilize private land.

The first meeting of the COST-Action LAND4FLOOD took place in Prague at the 9th and 10th of November 2017. The ARL is part of the core group and coordinates research stays within the members of the Action.

More information about the network and the COST-Action see http://www.land4flood.eu/