Mr Claude Nsobya

Claude earned his MSc in Environmental Change and Management from the University of Oxford in the UK, following a BSc in Environmental Sciences from Makerere University in Uganda. During his undergraduate studies, he carried out field-based research focused on assessing how smallholder farmers in Uganda are vulnerable to drought. His mixed methods study applied a theoretical framework incorporating exposure, sensitivity, and adaptive capacity to analyse vulnerability. For his MSc research, Claude continued his focus on drought-related studies, this time exploring how smallholder farmers adapt to drought conditions. He developed a conceptual framework that combined sustainable adaptation, transformational adaptation, and mal-adaptation, offering insights into both effective and ineffective responses to drought.  

Claude is currently embarking on a PhD researching the relationship between community resilience and community involvement in Flood Risk Management. He developed a six-capacity community resilience framework that he is using to assess resilience to flooding while incorporating literature on effective community engagement. His research combines these two strands of literature and argues that this approach provides a clearer understanding of how community resilience can be meaningfully and sustainably enhanced given that the current trend in global FRM appears to place communities at the forefront of flood impacts and there are somewhat expected to be engaged in FRM. Claude is particularly interested in under-explored contexts. One such focus is flash flooding in Uganda, where community-driven approaches to resilience remain under studied. Another fcous investigates groundwater flooding in Buckinghamshire, UK which is an often-overlooked source of flood risk.

He works with Project Groundwater which is a program funded by DEFRA (UK) under the Flood and Coastal Resilience Innovation Programme (FCRIP). FCRIP is made up of 25 projects led by local councils across the UK, with Buckinghamshire Council overseeing Project Groundwater. Through this work, Claude aims to contribute to a deeper understanding of how communities can effectively engage in flood risk management and what community resilience strategies prove most effective.