Assessment of extreme rainfall events and households’ adaptation in river Namatala catchment, Kyoga basin

Abstract

Extreme rainfall events in river Namatala catchment have increased over the past decades, yet these extremes have persistently caused disasters to the local population. Thus, this study identified extreme rainfall events, analyzed the trends of extreme rainfall events and it examined how households adapt to the extreme rainfall events in the river catchment. The study was conducted in the lower river Namatala catchment covering the districts of Mbale, Budaka and Butaleja. Gridded rainfall data was acquired using http://hydrology.princeton.edu/data/pgf/0.5deg/ (accessed: 15 March 2024) and the Climate Data Tool (CDT) at. Frequency distribution was used to determine extreme rainfall events River Namatala catchment, Mann-Kendall test and Sens’s slope test was used to determine the trend and magnitude of extreme rainfall events experienced in river Namatala catchment. Questionnaires and interview guides were used as data collection tools. The analysis included descriptive analysis computed using in Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) Version 23 and Microsoft Excel version 2016. The study revealed that May had the highest number of extreme rainfall events and January had the least number of extreme rainfall events. The trend showed an increase in the extreme rainfall events with positive z-scores of 2.164, 2.63 and 0.621 in the districts of Mbale, Butaleja and Budaka respectively. Digging trenches was found to be the most practiced adaptation measure by the households. The study concluded that extreme rainfall events have increased over time in Namatala catchment over time which requires stringent measures to as to mitigate their impacts. In order boost the resilience of the areas that are affected by the effects of the extreme rainfall events, we need to monitor frequently the occurrence of these events in the catchment, taking into account their socioeconomic network towards disaster resilience among the households along the river Namatala catchment.