The impact of flooding on poor communities in Lagos State, Nigeria: The case of the Makoko urban settlement

The novelty of this study is to examine how flooding leads to or aggravates poverty levels, which is highly plausible in the case of Nigeria and particularly the Makoko community. A survey design was employed with the collection of data through an ESAIQ. Out of the 500 target interviews, 358 were finally conducted in the core district areas of the community using the purposive sampling technique. In Nigeria as in many developing nations, the impacts of flooding are observed to be more devastating due to the increased vulnerability of many communities.

The main findings that emanate from the study reveal that flooding negatively and significantly impacts on community development. The implication is that flooding deters the advancement of community development within poor communities. Also, this study indicates that flooding exacerbates poverty levels due to its negative impacts on socioeconomic variables of poor communities. On the health perspective, the prevalence of floods has been noted to be highly devastating on humans during and after the event.