Reducing risk for erosion in Maldives : Comparative case study of local people’s and resort’s adaptive capacity in Laamu atoll

Abstract

This study is a comparative case study and investigates how local people on two islands called Maamendhoo and Maavah, and one resort operator called Six Senses in Laamu atoll, Maldives reduce their risk for erosion. This has been done by performing capacity analyses for these islands and the information has been collected mainly from interviews. The capacity analyses are based on which adaptive capacity they have regarding the risk reduction and adaptation measures; hazard reduction and avoidance, vulnerability reduction, preparedness for response and preparedness for recovery. It involves how local people and the resort operator both have adapted in the past and how they currently adapt (used capacity). Further it involves how they plan to adapt, which lacking capacities and also which unused capacities they have. The capacity analyses are analyzed to see if there are any gaps or weaknesses in their adaptive work and if the adaptive capacity differ between the resort island and the local islands and what the reason for this may be. The result from the capacity analyses shows that the resort have a lot of used capacity and implement many measures to reduce their risk to beach erosion compared to what local people have. The reason for this is mainly because the resort have more economic capacity to implement measures against erosion. The study shows that local people have more gaps in their adaptive work since they do not use all the measures and they have much more unused and lacking capacities compared to the resort island. The study is also investigating the interaction between local people/the resort and authorities. The result shows that authorities and Six Senses are supporting each others work with erosion, they are complementing each others work and the authorities are assisting with the resources the resort is requesting. The result also shows that local people do not think the authorities are supporting them in their adaptation work. The local people are complementing the authorities gaps/weaknesses in their adaptation work to a certain extent. The local people do not in general get the help they are requesting from the authorities, and they think that the authorities have not done enough to prevent the risk of erosion.