People-centred strategies to integrate disaster and climate resilience in Zimbabwe

Disasters are the result of an interplay between hazards, whether natural or man-made and community vulnerabilities, which often cause impacts of unprecedented magnitude in communities (Mavhura et al., 2021; Nyahunda, 2025). A considerable amount of literature acknowledges that climate change contributes to hazards such as extreme weather events, storm surges, cyclones, droughts, wildfires and disease epidemics (Kelman, 2019; Chitongo et al., 2024; Tirivangasi, 2024). In communities where vulnerabilities are rife, these hazards always escalate into disasters (Nyahunda et al., 2024). The nexus between climate change-related hazards and disasters has been documented through terms such as ‘climate-related disasters’ (Thomas and López, 2015; Sharpe and Davison, 2021). As climate-related disasters continue to wreak havoc in various parts of the world, resilience is lauded as a crucial measure to mitigate the impacts of climate change and disasters, or to enable systems and communities to prepare for and recover from such impacts (Imani et al., 2021). As such, resilience has found traction in disaster and climate change studies and policies (Rana, 2020). In the fields of disaster and climate change, there are common terms such as disaster resilience and climate resilience, which are considered pivotal in addressing disaster and climate risks (Rana, 2020; Fakhruddin et al., 2022).

Disaster and climate resilience are priorities in sustainable development, climate change adaptation and DRR (Parvin and Shaw, 2011; Paton and Johnson, 2017; Imani et al., 2021). Like the broader resilience concept, disaster and climate resilience have diverse conceptual meanings (Kruse et al., 2017). The United Nations International Strategy for Disaster Reduction (UNISDR, 2011) defines disaster resilience as the ability of a system, community or society vulnerable to hazards to withstand, address and recover from the adverse effects of hazards in a timely and efficient manner through the restoration and preservation of its basic functions and structures. Meanwhile, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC, 2014) conceptualises climate resilience as the ability of socio-ecological systems to absorb disturbances, adapt to stressors and change and self-organise while retaining the same basic structure and functions.

Despite the predominance of disaster and climate resilience in DRR and climate change agendas, the synergy between these concepts remains vague and fragmented (Wamsler and Johannessen, 2020). This is because disaster and climate resilience share areas of convergence, overlap, complementarity and synergy, but they continue to be treated as distinct and parallel constructs in policy and practice (Rana, 2020; Wan Mohd Rani et al., 2018). The impetus of the study was to highlight the importance of people-centred approaches to integrate disaster and climate resilience. In other words, the study examined people-centred strategies to integrate disaster and climate resilience from the perspectives of practitioners and community members in Zimbabwe’s rural communities. The study addresses a novel gap, whereby there have been calls to integrate disaster and climate resilience, without highlighting the strategies that can bring about this integration.

In addition, the importance of people-centred strategies in integrating the two concepts remains to be explored. This study believes that people-centred strategies to integrate disaster and climate resilience challenge the traditional top-down approaches where responsibilities for building integrated resilience are exclusively shouldered by technocrats and the public is perceived as passive recipients (Le Dé et al., 2021). We assert with confidence that the study represents one of the novel efforts to demonstrate the role and importance of local communities in developing strategies for integrated disaster and climate resilience. As such, the study amplifies the need for rural communities to play a central role in every step of integrating disaster and climate resilience. Following this section is the literature review, which is followed by the methodology. Thereafter, the study findings, discussion and conclusion are provided.

People-centred strategies to integrate disaster and climate resilience can be conceptualised as local people-stimulated actions that acknowledge the nexus between climate and disaster risks and the need to synchronise the resilience strategies (Jones, 2019). Again, people-centred strategies to integrate disaster and climate resilience involve context-specific and locally tailored approaches that enable at-risk communities to have a voice in shaping their own resilience (Le Dé et al., 2021). Through people-centred strategies that integrate disaster and climate resilience, at-risk communities actively participate in designing and implementing the devised strategies according to their needs, beliefs, values and aspirations (Martin et al., 2019). Although people-centred approaches are gaining traction in Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR) and climate change, they have yet to be explored in integrated disaster and climate resilience landscapes (Gill et al., 2021). Whereas there is a vast amount of literature on the integration of climate change adaptation and DRR, the same cannot be said for disaster and climate resilience. This indicates that the integration of disaster and climate resilience remains nascent (Gero et al., 2011; Pereira et al., 2017; Hallwright and Handmer, 2021; Wan Mohd Rani et al., 2018; Rana, 2020; Laurien et al., 2022).

Despite the scant studies on integrated disaster and climate resilience, it can be conceptualised as strategies that complement each other, foster coordination and acknowledge synergies in risk management, capacity development and shared targets, learning or goals (Laurien et al., 2022). This study capitalises on the lack of scientific evidence on people-centred strategies for disaster and climate resilience in Southern Africa (Sono et al., 2021; Conway and Vincent, 2021). In Zimbabwe, various organisations address issues related to disaster and climate resilience, carrying out similar yet diverse mandates aimed at building resilience (Mavhura et al., 2021). Thus, the synergy between resilience planning, goals, targets and activities still needs to be recognised between and across sectors (Mavhura et al., 2024). This position contradicts the inferences of Fakhruddin et al. (2022), who opine that disasters and climate resilience requires integrated approaches to enable communities to simultaneously manage multiple hazards and combine their decision-making process across all sectors Based on this, systems or communities’ resilience needs to integrate strategies to address these interlinked disaster and climate risks (Imani et al., 2021; Laurien et al., 2022; Nyahunda and Ncube, 2025).

Some enabling factors required to achieve the latter include institutional frameworks with clear policies that facilitate the integration between disaster and climate resilience at national and sub-national levels (Laurien et al., 2022). Other enabling factors hinge on addressing the gaps in environmental, socio-economic, institutional and infrastructural systems, where the lack of coordinated and synergistic disaster and climate resilience may prevent the attainment of integrated resilience (Xu et al., 2021). People-centred approaches are also necessary to enable at-risk communities to implement context-specific strategies that address their unique risks (Imani et al., 2021). As a growing phenomenon, disaster and climate resilience approaches, policies, techniques and goals are poised to lead to an understanding of how disaster and climate risks are shared across human, social, physical, financial and natural systems (Wan Mohd Rani et al., 2018). Based on the preceding, the following measures are coordinated to reduce exposure and vulnerabilities to disaster and climate risks (Rana, 2020). As the quest for integrated disaster and climate resilience gains momentum, such approaches need to be centred around the priorities and needs of at-risk communities, because they are the ones that grapple with the impacts of disaster and climate change (Le Dé et al., 2021). This illuminates the importance of people-centred approaches whereby strategies for integrated disaster and climate resilience are developed by and for those directly affected by disaster and climate risks (Martin et al., 2019; Gill et al., 2021).

There is compelling evidence of the importance of people-centred approaches in resilience building. In this regard, a study conducted in Switzerland by Scolobig et al. (2015) revealed that people-centred approaches are hinged on the assumption that involving people in disaster resilience building empowers them, encourages ownership, participation and responsibility. In alignment with this, Mabon et al. (2021) found that in Quang Nam, Vietnam, people-centred approaches or bottom-up approaches enable at-risk communities to leverage traditional practices and indigenous knowledge in the face of shocks, thereby sustaining their livelihoods. In Bangladesh, Azad et al. (2019) propound that disaster management has shifted to leveraging the capacities of communities to assess their vulnerabilities and develop strategies and resources to mitigate the impact of the identified hazards, as well as ways to respond. Similar sentiments are echoed by Le Dé et al. (2021), who posit that in New Zealand, people-centred approaches in the realm of disaster and climate resilience have received wide acceptance because stakeholders consider communities as best judges of their own vulnerability and capable of making the best decisions regarding their contextual resilience. Despite a wealth of literature converging in highlighting the importance of people-centred approaches in disaster and climate resilience building, little is known about the importance of people-centred approaches in integrating disaster and climate resilience concepts as a way of recognising the synergies and coherence they share.

In highlighting people-centred strategies to integrate disaster and climate resilience, the study used the Chimanimani District in Manicaland Province, Zimbabwe, as a case (Saurombe and Shava, 2021). Chimanimani District borders Mozambique in the east, Buhera District in the west, Mutare District in the north and Chipinge District in the south (Tirivangasi and Nyahunda, 2025). As despicted in Figure 1, the district has 23 administrative wards, and subsistence farming is the primary source of family income and food (Chanza et al., 2020). This study was conducted against the backdrop that climate change management, governance and resilience-building endeavours are housed under the Ministry of Environment, Climate, Tourism, Hospitality and Industry. In contrast, disaster management and disaster risk reduction endeavours belong to the Department of Civil Protection, housed under the Ministry of Local Government and Public Works (Mavhura et al., 2021).

In addition, various development agencies employ diverse climate and disaster resilience-building approaches with a common goal, but follow parallel methods. This study serves as the basis for exploring strategies to integrate disaster and climate resilience from the perspective of rural communities (Nyahunda et al., 2026). In addition, the need to examine people-centred strategies to integrate disaster and climate resilience was informed by the high disaster profile of the district, where various hazards (floods, cyclones, landslides, droughts, heatwaves, gullies and epidemics) overlap, destabilising the functioning of the communities (Tirivangasi et al., 2023; Kudejira, 2023). This study focused on climate-related disasters, wherein climate-driven hazards exacerbate community vulnerabilities, leading to catastrophe (Nyahunda, 2025). Based on this, the primary focus of the study was on how integrated disaster and climate resilience can lead to coherent strategies for addressing the risks faced by communities.

The study adopted the Constructivist Grounded Theory (CGT) approach as its methodology. This was adopted as the study aimed to establish the communities’ perspectives on people-centred strategies for integrating disaster and climate resilience (Charmaz, 2020). In this view, CGT lies within qualitative research approaches and has naturalistic features (Charmaz, 2020). The adoption of CGT enables researchers to establish the worldviews, experiences, perceptions and insights of the participants (Bryant and Charmaz, 2019). As Charmaz (2017) posits, CGT is a qualitative approach to searching for social processes through human interactions, aiming to generate a theory grounded in empirical data. Van Breda (2018) states that qualitative research approaches best suit resilience studies because the interface between the qualitative approach and the resilience approach allows the experiences and voices of the participants to come to the fore. The reliance on the CGT approach aimed to generate new perspectives and insights on people-centred strategies for integrating disaster and climate resilience, considering the social dynamics of communities that can contribute to the integration of disaster and climate resilience approaches (Charmaz and Thornberg, 2021).

The researchers first utilised the purposive sampling technique to select the study participants. In grounded theory studies, purposive sampling relies on the researcher’s judgement to select the initial cohort of participants, initiating constant data collection and analysis (Adebayo and Ackers, 2021). Following the initial data collection and analysis round, the researchers employed a theoretical sampling technique (Charmaz and Thornberg, 2021). Through theoretical sampling, the themes that emerged in the first round of data collection informed the questions to be asked and the selection of individuals deemed appropriate to answer the questions generated from the previous interviews (Charmaz, 2020). By following this approach, the study’s sample was gathered in phases (Charmaz, 2020). Semi-structured interviews (SSIs and Focus Group Discussions (FGDs) were used as data collection methods. FGDs were conducted with community members, and SSIs were conducted with government and NGO officials involved in resilience-building in Chimanimani District.

A total of 28 community members participated in four FGDs, with participants ranging between 5 and 6 per group. In addition, six key informants, comprising three from NGOs and three from the government, participated in semi-structured interviews. Thus, a total of 28 participants participated in the study. These were drawn from eight wards, namely Ward 16 (Tiya), Ward 4 (Nhedziwa), Ward 15 (Chimanimani), Ward 12 (Charleshood), Ward 10 (Chikukwa), Ward 21 (Ngorima), Ward 18 (Nechirinda and Bvumbura). This study found solace in the expositions of Charmaz (2020), who contends that qualitative studies require smaller samples because there is a likelihood of reaching data saturation. Based on this, it can be underscored that the sample size of the study was suitable to achieve theoretical saturation as prescribed in grounded theory studies, where no new similarities or differences were identified as data collection and analysis unfolded (Bryant and Charmaz, 2019). In justifying the sample size of 28 participants in this study, the authors further draw inspiration from Aldiabat and Le Navenec (2018), who opine that it is not only the sample size that is important but also the number of interviews held with each participant and the length of each of them. In this study, theoretical saturation was achieved based on the researchers’ experiences in collecting and analysing fewer interviews, where they established that no new data and concepts were appearing in answering the research questions of the study.

The preliminary data analysis process was done concurrently with data collection. After each interview, the researchers organised and examined the data (Charmaz, 2020). The researchers relied on the CGT data analysis stages outlined by Bryant and Charmaz (2019). The first stage involved open coding, where a line-by-line examination of the data was conducted. At this stage, codes were assigned to short phrases that represent the participants’ own words. This was meant to identify processes and actions with the data. This was followed by axial coding, whereby related and dominant codes were identified. This was followed by the identification of the relationships between earlier codes, which informed the emergence of categories. The final stage involved constant comparison of data and categories. At this stage, the researchers sought to identify dimensions, similarities and patterns within the data. As a final stage, the Atlas ti (GmbH,2018) software was further utilised to assist in sorting and comparing statements on specific issues across the codes. The final categories were compared with the existing literature using the researchers’ inductive analysis.

This research was cleared by the Faculty of Natural and Agricultural Sciences Ethics Committee (FNASREC) and the University Senate Committee for Research Ethics (NWU-SCRE) of the North-West University (NWU-01310–22-A9). Furthermore, the Ministry of Local Government and Public Works, the Manicaland Secretary for Provincial Affairs and Devolution and the District Development Coordinator for Chimanimani Rural District Council granted clearance to conduct the research. The researchers adhered to the ethical principles of informed consent, anonymity, confidentiality, voluntary participation and avoidance of harm.

This section presents the study’s findings from the focus group discussions and semi-structured interviews. In this regard, the predominant categories were identified during the concurrent data collection and analysis process, and they were further classified into themes for easy presentation of the findings.

In this theme, the study aimed to understand the perspectives of community members and practitioners on the relationships between disasters and climate resilience. That said, perceptions from most community members revealed that climate and disaster resilience serve the same purpose of reducing risks and addressing vulnerability and exposure. For this reason, it was suggested that the two concepts need to be integrated. Since these concepts have some convergences, community members indicated that when devising resilience strategies, they should not determine whether they are intended for disaster or climate risks. Community members who saw the links between disaster and climate resilience conceptualised integrated disaster and climate resilience as an equal approach to mitigating disaster and climate change impacts. In this view, they argue that resilience strategies against disaster and climate risks must demonstrate coherence, as they aim to achieve the same goal. The following narration represents some of the perceptions shared by community members.

“[…] To integrate disaster and climate resilience means combining efforts meant for disaster and climate resilience to achieve a common goal […]” (FGD, Chimanimani).

The practitioners also indicated that disaster and climate resilience are the same issues. In identifying the links between the two, practitioners conceptualised integrated disaster and climate resilience as an understanding of the close relationship between the hazards or risks communities face and the importance of developing coherent and synergistic strategies to address them. Some practitioners conceptualised integration as a way in which departments dealing with disaster and climate change issues work together and share information. This is because both institutional and conceptual gaps still exist in recognising the nexus between disaster and climate resilience. The following excerpts confirm this.

“[…] The two (disaster and climate resilience are flip sides of the same coin. They deal with the same things from different angles […]” (Interview, NGO official).

“[…] There is a close relationship between the hazards faced by our communities, most of which are climate-related. When we talk about integration, it means working together at the departmental level and exchanging notes […]” (Interview, NGO official).

Responses from community members and practitioners converged in illuminating that disaster and climate resilience concepts are poised to achieve the same goal. It was recommended that climate-related disaster risks be integrated into resilience strategy planning.

The common thread from community members who identified the links between disaster and climate resilience was that disaster and climate resilience need to be integrated through people-centred approaches. In this view, it was suggested that community members poised to be beneficiaries of disaster and climate resilience should take the lead in designing and implementing integrated strategies. Whereas some community members acknowledged the role of government and non-governmental organisations in supporting their resilience initiatives, they reiterated that they need to play a central role in the integration process. The following excerpts support this:

Perceptions from practitioners, corroborated by community members, reiterate that disaster and climate risks pose equal threats to the lives and livelihoods of communities. As such, the resilience strategies against these threats need to show some coherence. The following narration confirms this:

From the above statements, the quest to integrate disaster and climate resilience should be people-centred and acknowledge the role of local communities since disaster and climate risks are community experiences.

After identifying the need to integrate disaster and climate resilience, participants highlighted some people-centred strategies to achieve this goal. These are presented in the sub-sections below.

The participants identified the socio-economic strategies of integrating disaster and climate resilience. The common thread in the interviews was that integrated disaster and climate resilience are important for socio-economic planning. It was revealed that since disasters and climate risks cause diverse destabilisation in their socio-economic systems, response strategies such as strengthening social protection systems, pursuing resilient livelihoods and risk management and reduction can bring disaster and climate resilience together. Furthermore, it was argued that these strategies aim to mitigate the economic losses resulting from climate change and disasters. Through coordinated risk reduction and management, communities can establish feedback loops where lessons learnt from climate resilience can also inform hazard mapping as a preventative measure against disasters and climate risks. This was deemed important in enabling communities to respond to emerging hazards in a dynamic manner. By pursuing resilient livelihoods through livelihood diversification, the study established that communities develop a sense of preparedness and utilise their resources in all segments of disaster and climate planning and response, which in turn produces socio-economic benefits. Again, it was submitted that pursuing resilient livelihoods enables communities to adapt to the changing conditions driven by climate change and its associated disasters. This makes it easy for communities to integrate their resilience. Community members had the following to say.

“[…] The participation of communities in identifying risks can enable them to recognise challenges posed by disasters and climate change in the socio-economic sphere. This understanding is pivotal in identifying how to integrate resilience into socio-economic planning […]” FGD, Tiya)

The perceptions of participants further revealed that coherent risk management and reduction strategies can bring disaster and climate resilience together, as they increase the likelihood of producing an effective and efficient strategy to reduce socio-economic vulnerabilities. What emerged from the participants is that socio-economic strategies to integrate disaster and climate resilience need to be participatory. The following narrations highlight some of the perceptions:

Some responses pointed out that social protection systems, such as savings groups or stockvels, popularly known as Mikando, can help communities rebuild and recover their livelihoods after climate-related disasters. A coordinated approach to enhancing social protection systems was lauded as crucial in ensuring that vulnerable populations develop locally based resources to cushion them in the face of climate-related disasters.

The findings revealed that coordinated and coherent strategies in environmental planning can bring disaster and climate resilience together. Firstly, it was established that sectoral policies in environmental planning can lead to integrated disaster and climate resilience in areas such as water management, agriculture, energy and land use. The focus on aligning policies on agriculture, land use, energy and water management was deemed important for promoting sustainable practices that reduce the impact of climate change and natural hazards. Secondly, the views of practitioners highlighted that climate change and disasters are considered cross-cutting issues in sectors such as energy, water, land use and agriculture. Therefore, there should be coordinated planning that depicts the alignment of climate-related disaster impacts and solutions to address these impacts. This approach was deemed the departure point for integrated disaster and climate resilience, whereby measures to reduce the carbon footprint that contributes to climate change-related hazards will be taken. The participants further revealed that at-risk communities should actively participate in environmental planning strategies to integrate disaster and climate resilience. It was proposed that this would be achieved by adopting land-use strategies that protect the environment and rely on renewable energy and climate-smart agriculture practices. The following narrations characterise some of the responses:

The common thread from the findings is that when sectoral policies are integrated and showcase the symbiotic relationship between disaster and climate resilience, communities will easily understand this relationship. This would foster a holistic approach that considers the interactions between different sectors. Furthermore, this development is poised to promote adaptive, efficient and sustainable solutions to complex challenges for communities as they strive to protect their economic, physical and environmental assets in pursuit of integrated disaster and climate resilience.

As the participants suggested strategies to integrate disaster and climate resilience, it emerged that coherent and synergistic institutional planning can make integrated disaster and climate resilience attainable. In light of this, it was established that coordination and collaboration between institutions responsible for disaster and climate change can provide fertile grounds for the integration of disaster and climate resilience. This point was raised against the backdrop of information that most agencies operating in Chimanimani District execute similar mandates towards building resilience, but from diverse standpoints. As such, a need exists for complementary and synergistic institutional roles across and among institutions to bring disaster and climate resilience together. The participants suggested institutional strategies such as community-level risk management and reduction, hinged on participatory governance, as enabling avenues to integrate disaster and climate resilience. It was also posited that community-level governance strategies in risk management and reduction would allow communities to develop mechanisms that address diverse risks and enhance their response capacities to disasters and climate change impacts. The following narration confirms some of the preceding points:

The participants further revealed that institutional strategies to integrate disaster and climate resilience evolve around continuous learning and participation in risk reduction. According to practitioners, the simultaneous risks posed by disasters and climate change would enable at-risk communities to learn and act in the face of these risks. The ability to learn and participate in risk reduction is a win for both disaster and climate resilience, which makes their integration attainable. Through institution-based strategies, it was revealed that community participation in risk reduction provides a vantage point for at-risk communities to take the lead in community-based monitoring and evaluation mechanisms, assessing their exposure to disaster and climate risks. Again, communities could determine the effectiveness of resilience strategies aimed at reducing disaster and climate risks.

What emerged from the study’s findings is that considering the simultaneous risks posed by disasters and climate change to infrastructure highlights the need for forward-thinking and coordinated planning in building resilient infrastructure. The general sentiment from the participants was that climate-change-related disasters have taken a toll on community infrastructure in Chimanimani District. This infrastructure includes roads, houses, healthcare centres, schools, community halls and business centres. As a result, community preparedness and hazard reduction approaches should acknowledge the symbiotic relationship between climate change and disasters, and foster coordinated thinking in building disaster- and climate-resilient infrastructure. The following narrations shed more light on this:

Under this theme, it was mainly posited that coordinated planning shared goals in designing and constructing infrastructure that can withstand disruptions caused by climate change, natural hazards and disasters can bring disaster and climate resilience together.

The impetus of this study was to highlight the people-centred strategies to integrate disaster and climate resilience into different levels of planning from the viewpoint of local communities and practitioners in Chimanimani District of Zimbabwe. Before delving into the strategies, the study explored the perceptions of community members and practitioners on the links between disaster and climate resilience. In this regard, the general sentiment from both focus group discussions and semi-structured interviews was that disaster and climate resilience aim to achieve the same goals in reducing risk and vulnerability, which serves as a justification for their integration. Following this, the study established how practitioners and community members conceptualise integrated disaster and climate resilience. In this view, community members viewed integrated disaster and climate resilience as an understanding of the simultaneous risks posed by climate change and disasters, as well as the need for developing coherent response strategies.

According to practitioners, integrated disaster and climate resilience entails departments or organisations working together to produce coherent and synergistic resilience outcomes and exchanging information. The conceptualisation of integrated disaster and climate resilience by community members lends credence to Fakhruddin et al. (2022), who inferred that integrated resilience hinges on recognising that disasters and climate change pose multiple risks to communities and that risk management strategies should be complementary, depicting shared understanding and coordination elements. Furthermore, the conceptualisation of integrated disaster and climate resilience provided by practitioners resonates with the definition of integration by Nemakonde (2016), who view it as a continuum ranging from collaboration and shared norms to coordination, cooperation, informal contacts and structural adjustment. This study suggests that through integrated disaster and climate resilience planning, organisations and departments responsible for DRR and climate change can develop coherent and effective measures aimed at reducing disaster and climate risks.

The findings further revealed strategies for integrating the two concepts (disaster and climate resilience). By exploring the strategies to integrate disaster and climate resilience, the study addresses the concerns raised by Xu et al. (2021), who posit that enabling factors to achieve integrated resilience hinge on addressing the gaps in environmental, socioeconomic, institutional and infrastructural systems, where the lack of coordinated and synergistic approaches may prevent the attainment of integrated resilience. This study aimed to establish how disaster and climate resilience can be integrated. The study’s findings revealed socioeconomic, environmental, institutional and infrastructural strategies for integrating disaster and climate resilience. Importantly, the findings highlighted that these strategies need to be people-centred, so that local communities understand the diverse and interrelated nature of the threats they face and how to develop holistic, contextual solutions to address them according to their priorities.

In light of the foregoing, socio-economic strategies are necessary to integrate activities, approaches, decision-making processes and policies in response to these risks. These socio-economic strategies can be realised through coordinated strategies in risk management, pursuing resilient livelihoods and strengthening social protection systems. This study argues that by creating coherent and synergistic approaches in the preceding facets, communities can address the multifaceted nature of disaster and climate risks in a holistic manner. Social protection systems, in the form of local credits and savings groups (Mikando), allow at-risk communities to mobilise the necessary financial resources to meet their needs in addressing disaster and climate risks. These measures make communities recover quickly from disasters and other climate change impacts. This ultimately leads to integrated disaster and climate resilience. Given the multifaceted dangers posed by climate change-related disasters to humans and the environment, the study findings revealed that coordinated and coherent sectoral policies in environmental planning can lead to integrated disaster and climate resilience. This can be achieved through a sectoral alignment of energy, water management, agriculture, social development and land-use policies to attain coherent outcomes. Based on the latter, environmental strategies to integrate disaster and climate resilience involve coordinated planning and decision-making across the sectors mentioned above, which may mitigate the factors that accelerate climate change and natural hazards that often escalate into disasters. The study findings further revealed that people-centred integrated strategies for disaster and climate resilience approaches can be institutional-based.

From the findings, institutional strategies are characterised by the clarity of institutional mandates, which are still marked by the conflation of roles and duplication of services at the national institutional level. Once the integration is achieved, communities may reap the benefits of integrated approaches through participatory risk management, where, through their local institutions, they continuously learn and follow interconnected measures to address the hazards or risks they face. Furthermore, the findings established that people-centred institutional strategies may trigger community-based monitoring and evaluation of disaster and climate resilience strategies. This enhances people-centredness as communities develop and share information, which helps them meet their collective resilience goals. The findings corroborate the expositions of Laurien et al., (2022), who infer that institutional frameworks with clear policies facilitate the integration between disaster and climate resilience at national and sub-national levels. By so doing, integrated disaster and climate resilience can be easily realised. Based on the findings, it can be posited that people-centred institutional strategies for disaster and climate resilience contribute to forward-thinking and coordinated planning in the construction of disaster- and climate-resilient infrastructure.

The overarching point on this aspect is that when integrated approaches become a lived reality at policy and practice levels, communities and practitioners can share their goals and coordinate their planning. This contributes to coherent and effective efforts in designing resilient infrastructure, such as roads, houses, healthcare centres, network systems and dams, that can withstand pressures evolving from disasters and climate change. It is worth noting that people-centred strategies for integrating disaster and climate resilience are interlinked. However, they have yet to be extensively featured in the literature on community resilience to disasters and climate change. To this end, this study posits that people-centred strategies to integrate disaster and climate resilience are cornerstones of community resilience. They address the fragmentation between disaster and climate resilience concepts in policy and practice.

The main thread in the study is that integrated disaster and climate resilience needs to be people-centred through participatory planning, shared understanding, collaborative decision-making, and complementary strategies for preparing, mitigating and responding to risks. This study was solution-driven in the sense that it suggested ways to integrate disaster and climate resilience. In this view, the study uncovered people-centred strategies to integrate disaster and climate resilience, encompassing socioeconomic, institutional, environmental and infrastructural aspects. These strategies demonstrate the need to address the multifaceted nature of hazards and risks holistically, which lays fertile grounds for integrated resilience. These integrated strategies highlighted the importance of community-based participatory approaches, as this is where resilience to disaster and climate risks is developed and experienced. Through the people-centredness of the outlined strategies, the study concludes that although clear pathways for integrating disaster and climate resilience are required at the national level through policies that harmonise the approaches and strategies, rural communities are well-positioned to frame the integrated disaster and climate resilience strategies that work for them. Since there are currently no clear pathways for integrating disaster and climate resilience at policy and practice levels, this study contends that the suggested ways to integrate the two concepts can be easily adopted and scaled at national and sub-national levels. Besides this study uncovering people-centred strategies for integrated disaster and climate resilience, there are no frameworks for integrating disaster and climate resilience concepts into policy and planning in Zimbabwe and beyond. This study foresees the need to develop a framework or model that integrates disaster and climate resilience to address this gap. In this view, the model should mainstream the views and aspirations of rural communities facing disaster and climate risks.

The authors acknowledge the North West University through the NWU Doctoral Bursary and the Faculty of Natural and Agricultural Sciences (FNAS) Bursary for providing financial support to the study.