International Journal of River Basin Management

ISSN: 1571-5124 (Print) 1814-2060 (Online) Journal homepage: http://www.tandfonline.com/loi/trbm20

Recent Slovak flood protection relative to

integrated flood risk management

Ľubomír Solín

To cite this article: Ľubomír Solín (2015) Recent Slovak flood protection relative to integrated
flood risk management, International Journal of River Basin Management, 13:4, 463-473, DOI:
10.1080/15715124.2015.1022868

To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/15715124.2015.1022868

Published online: 24 Mar 2015.

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 Intl. J. River Basin Management Vol. 13, No. 4 (December 2015), pp. 463–473
# 2015 International Association for Hydro-Environment Engineering and Research

Research paper

Recent Slovak flood protection relative to integrated flood risk management

ĽUBOMÍR SOLÍN, Institute of Geography, Slovak Academy of Sciences, Štefánikova 49, 814 73 Bratislava, Slovakia
Email: solin@savba.sk

ABSTRACT
The exclusive application of the engineering approach to flood defence is a matter of increasing disapproval. This has led to a new paradigm in flood
management – the integrated management of flood risk. The change from engineering-based flood protection to the integrated management of flood risk
Downloaded by [Monash University Library] at 12:31 20 December 2015

is comparatively slow and has varied in different countries. In Slovakia, the engineering approach enjoys a strong tradition. Recently, the parliament and
the government of the Slovak Republic (SR) approved documents which establish new legal and operational frameworks for flood defence in the SR.
The aim of this paper is to analyse these documents regarding the concept of integrated flood risk management. The analysis shows that flood protection
continues to be based on the traditional engineering approach, which reduces flooding by technical structures. How integrated flood risk assessment and
management can eliminate the consequences of engineering flood management is presented through two approaches to preliminary flood risk
assessment.

Keywords: Flood risk; flood hazard; vulnerability; engineering flood protection; integrated flood risk management

1 Introduction it is also important to reduce the negative consequences of flood-

Engineering flood management aims to reduce flooding, mainly
by constructing big water reservoirs, protective dikes, and
polders, and by adjusting river channels. However, the exclusive
application of this engineering approach has come under strong
criticism in recent years (cf. Fleming 2002, Sayers et al. 2002,
Merz et al. 2010, Liao 2014). The impulse for such critical com-
ments is the idea, which has appeared in various forms over the
last 70 years (White 1974), that the negative and disastrous
effects of natural phenomena are not altogether attributable to
natural phenomena alone, as they may also result from the vul-
nerability of society. So, in evaluating disaster risks, an examin-
ation of social vulnerability needs to be considered with at least
the same importance that is devoted to understanding and addres-
sing natural hazards (Wisner et al. 2004). Against this backdrop
of changing attitudes regarding the impact of natural disasters,
together with the changing value system of society which now
prefers a sustainable environmental system (Plate 2002), a new
paradigm of flood protection has begun to gradually form – inte-
grated flood risk management (Brown and Damery 2002,
Fleming 2002, APFM 2004, Werritty 2006, ISDR/UN 2007).
This new paradigm is a more comprehensive approach to flood
risk management; in addition to restricting the scope of flooding,
ing by non-structural measures. For example, the ISDR/UN
(2007) document focuses on the following five priorities,
which reduce the loss of life and damage to social, economic,
and environmental assets when hazards strike:
. ensure that disaster risk reduction is a national and local pri-
ority, with a strong institutional basis for implementation;
. identify, assess, and monitor disaster risks and enhance early
warning;
. use knowledge, innovation, and education to build a culture of
safety and resilience at all levels;
. reduce the underlying risk factors; and
. strengthen disaster preparedness for an effective response at all
levels.
This change from a style of management built exclusively on
engineering to the integrated management of flood risk is not
so easy. This process is relatively slow, and there are some differ-
ences among countries in terms of legislation and regulatory fra-
meworks, as well as the methodology of flood risk assessment
(Brouwer and van Ek 2004, Pottier et al. 2005, Wheater 2006,
Galloway 2008, Klijn et al. 2008, Bründl et al. 2009, Holub
and Fuchs 2009, Rauken and Kelman 2010, Cashman 2011,

Received on 20 June 2013. Accepted on 7 February 2015.

ISSN 1571-5124 print/ISSN 1814-2060 online

http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/15715124.2015.1022868
http://www.tandfonline.com
463
 464 Ľubomı́r Solı́n
Dawson et al. 2011, Kuhlicke et al. 2011, Hassel 2012, Meyer
et al. 2012).
In Slovakia, the engineering approach enjoys a strong tra-
dition. Recently, the parliament of the Slovak Republic (SR)
approved Act No. 7/2010 regarding Flood defence, and the gov-
ernment of the SR adopted three documents: (1) Conception of
Water Management Policy of the SR until 2015 (Government
of the SR 2006); (2) Programme of Landscape Revitalization
and Integrated Management of River Basins in the SR (Govern-
ment of the SR 2010); and (3) Analysis of the Current State of
Flood Defence in the SR, including the Stage of Implementation
of the Flood Prediction and Warning System (Government of SR
2011). Combined, they establish new legislative and operational
frameworks for flood protection in the SR. A question emerges as
to what extent they provide a framework for a gradual transition
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from conventional engineering-based flood protection to inte-
grated flood risk management. The aim of this paper is to
briefly characterize the approved documents and analyse them
with regard to the concept of integrated flood risk management.
The remainder of this paper is divided into four sections. In
Section 2, the basic concepts of flood risk and its assessment
and management are briefly reviewed. In Section 3, the oper-
ational governmental and parliamentary legal documents on
flood management are characterized, and in Section 4, docu-
ments are analysed regarding the integrated flood risk manage-
ment concept. Section 5 summarizes the current state and
outlines the possible challenges.
2 Conceptual frameworks of engineered and integrated
flood risk assessment and management
2.1 Concepts of risk
As reported in DETR (2000), basically, it is possible to dis-
tinguish between two concepts of flood risk: single scale and
multidimensional scale. In the framework of single-scale
concept, flood risk is understood as a function of flood hazard
only, that is,
flood risk = flood hazard.
The risk and the natural phenomenon (hazard) are interpreted
and used as synonyms (e.g. Alwang et al. 2001). Flood risk is
defined as the probability F that the maximum annual discharge
Qmax will not exceed a specified value q. An estimation of annual
maximum discharge values for specified probabilities is the
primary basis for the assessment of safety standards of some
engineering structure. The parameters of dams, protecting
dikes, and channel adjustments are designed to retain or
control flood discharges with the specified probability F
(where F ¼ 0.02, 0.01, 0.001 or less).
The concept of multidimensional scale allows for a wider
understanding of risk:
Risk is the expected loss (of lives, persons injured, property
damaged, and economic activity disrupted) due to a particular
hazard for a given area and reference period. (UN 1992)
The flood risk is defined as the product of the probability of
occurrence of the flood hazard and the negative consequences
caused by flooding (Einstein 1988, Meyer et al. 2007), that is,
risk = probability × negative consequences.
Negative consequences depend on the vulnerability and status
(and usually represent the overall magnitude of number of
objects) of the economic, social, and environmental systems of
the given territory. The concept of vulnerability is now devel-
oped in social, environmental, and geographical sciences,
which attribute it as special content in connection with the man-
agement of natural disasters and sustainable development
(Brown and Damery 2002, Werritty 2006). The literature
brings different definitions and conceptual frameworks of vul-
nerability (e.g. Morrow 1999, Tapsell et al. 2002, Turner et al.
2003, Cutter et al. 2003, Sarewitz et al. 2003, Green 2004,
Wisner et al. 2004, Adger et al. 2004, Schneiderbauer and
Ehrlich 2004, Messner and Meyer 2005). Thywissen (2006),
for instance, prepared a summarizing review of definitions of
the term, and Birkmann (2006) presented a certain systematiza-
tion of views on vulnerability.
Vulnerability is defined as follows:
Inherent characteristics of a system that create the potential for
harm but are independent of the probabilistic of event risk of
any particular hazard or extreme event (Sarewitz et al. 2003)
which represents the minimum common basis for the definition
of vulnerability. Attributes expressing the inherent predisposi-
tion (potential) of economic, social, and environmental systems
to damage and loss (economic dimension of vulnerability), or,
in case of human system liability to drowning or injury, are
cores of the concept susceptibility. The social dimension of vul-
nerability is embodied in the concepts of resistance and resili-
ence, which characterize a person or group in terms of their
capacity to anticipate, cope with, resist, and recover from the
impact of a natural hazard (Blaikie et al. 1994, Brown, &
Damery 2002, Wisner et al. 2004). Meanwhile, the concept of
susceptibility represents the passive (negative) component of
vulnerability. Vulnerability increases with increasing suscepti-
bility. On the other side, the concepts of resistance and resilience
are active (positive) components of vulnerability and, with
increasing resistance and/or resilience, the vulnerability of a
system decreases.
2.2 Flood risk assessment and flood risk management
In spite of the diverging views on the fundamental scientific prin-
ciples of risk assessment and management (Ale et al. 2010, Aven
2012, Haimes 2012), flood risk assessment remains a set of
activities for the identification, measurement, and quantification
 Recent Slovak flood protection relative to integrated flood risk management 465

of the risk connected with flooding. Flood risk management is
therefore a set of policy options aimed at reducing flood risk.
As suggested by Haimes (2009), some authors do not distinguish
between risk assessment and management and incorporate risk
assessment within the border risk management label.
The character of activities and policies of flood risk assess-
ment and management is associated with the understanding of
risk. The concept of flood risk standing in the background of
the engineering approach to flood risk assessment and manage-
ment is based at the evaluation of river reaches in terms of
their bank stability and the capacity of their cross-section profiles
to transport flood discharges of specified probability. In cases
where river reaches do not satisfy the specified level of safety
relating to different residential zones and areas of economic
activities, engineering flood management is focused on the fol-
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local scales (Van der Veen 2004, Messner and Meyer 2005,
FLOODsite 2006, Apel et al. 2009).
The aim of integrated flood risk management is to reduce
flood risk, that is, decrease the negative consequences of floods
to a tolerable level, which can be a result of public discussion
or governmental regulation. From the multidimensional defi-
nition of flood risk, this can be achieved by the application of
three strategies (APFM 2004):
. strategy with the aim of reducing flooding;
. strategy with the aim of reducing flood vulnerability; and
. strategy with the aim of mitigating (partly funding) the nega-
tive consequence of floods.
There are several actions connected with each strategy
(Table 1). The best strategy for risk reduction may be either a

lowing actions: combination of several strategies or the dominant application

of a single strategy. The specific mixture of individual strategies
(1) storing run-off (e.g. retention basins, wetlands, and should reflect the results of the integrated flood risk assessment.
reservoirs);
(2) increasing the capacity of the river (e.g. bypass channels,
channel deepening, or widening); 3 Basic marks of legal and operational documents of flood
(3) separating the river from the population (e.g. land use protection in the SR
control, dikes, flood-proofing, and house raising); and
(4) emergency management during a flood (e.g. flood warning, The legal and operational framework for flood defence in the SR
emergency works to raise or strengthen dikes, flood-proof- is constituted on the following four documents:
ing, and evacuation). Document 1: Conception of the Water Management Policy of the
SR until 2015.
These measures, with the exception of (4), are linked with the
The document dealing with defence against extreme hydrologi-
strategy of reducing flooding and are aimed at the protection of
cal events stresses:
humans against a flood. An engineering flood risk management
seeks to provide a more or less equal level of protection, that . building a flood warning and forecasting system;
is, every locality should be protected by the same safety standard
(Meyer et al. 2007). Table 1 Flood defence strategies and measures (APFM 2004)
The integrated approach to flood risk assessment is based on
the multidimensional concept of flood risk and addresses the Strategy Options
assessment of flood risk in a more complex way, that is, as the Reducing flooding Dams and reservoirs
combination of flood hazard and expected negative conse- Dikes, levees, and flood
quences. Concept vulnerability is a key factor in the assessment embankments
High-flow diversions
of expected losses. Assessment of vulnerability is usually place-
Basin management
based (Cutter et al. 2003, 2008, Borden et al. 2007, Simpson and
Channel improvements
Human 2008), that , associated with spatial units. These units can Reducing susceptibility to damage Flood plain zoning and
be defined on the basis of administrative boundaries (e.g. muni- regulation
cipalities) for which statistical data on their social, economic, and Development and redevelopment
environmental systems are available. The data of administrative policies
units can be disaggregated into smaller spatial units – grid cells Design and location facilities
by means of polygons constructed by aggregation of land use Housing and building codes
data (Meyer et al. 2007, 2009, 2012). The flood risk is then Flood-proofing
expressed for each grid. Mitigating the impacts of flooding Flood forecasting and warning
An assessment of the flood risk of spatial units as a product of Information and education
Disaster preparedness
flood hazard and flood vulnerability can be expressed by quanti-
Post flood recovery
tative (mean annual damage) or qualitative (ranking) means
Flood insurance
(FLOODsite 2006, Raaijmakers et al. 2008, Haimes 2009,
Preserving the natural resources of Flood plain zoning and
Meyer et al. 2009). Source data on flood hazard and vulnerability flood plain regulation
depend on the scale of research, that is, national, regional, or
 466 Ľubomı́r Solı́n
. restoring damaged objects from previous floods; and
. building flood defence structures. The strategy in this regard
specifies the particular reaches of channels that need adjust-
ment, the stabilization sections of dikes and dams that need
reconstruction, and other investments involved with the
adjustment of run-off.
Document 2: Landscape Revitalization and Integrated Basin
Management Programme of the Slovak Republic.
This programme was encouraged by non-governmental organiz-
ations that pointed to the fact that the construction of the costly
engineering structures on a watercourse has a negative impact
on the environment. The principal aim and priority of the pro-
gramme was the exclusive retention of rainwater in the forest
region and farmland landscape by small technical structures
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(e.g. barriers on forest roads and skidding tracks, soaking holes
and belts along roads, retaining lakes, ravelled willow barriers,
restoration of bulks, irrigation rills along contour-lines, etc.).
Flood defence measures on small streams had the form of small
hydraulic structures, such as weirs and steps. It was supposed
that these measures should decrease the frequency of flood
events, first of all in municipalities located in headwater basins,
with the accompanying synergic effects on the frequency of
flood events next to medium-sized and big rivers. The programme
was launched in 2010 but, after the March 2012 elections, the
project was cancelled by the new government. The reason for
this step was the reduction of flooding by somehow controlling
the movement of rainwater in the headwater basins, almost exclu-
sively by small technical structures, does not lead to efficient
flood protection. And the idea that they should constitute the
core of the flood protection strategy was considered misleading.
Document 3: Analysis of the Current Status of Flood Defence in
the Slovak Republic, including the Current Implementation Stage
of the Flood Warning and Forecast Systems.
After the widescale flooding that struck the country in the spring
and summer of 2010, which caused damage to more than 33,000
inhabitants, the SR government obliged the Ministry of Agricul-
ture, the Ministry of the Environment, and the Ministry of
Regional Development to prepare an analysis of the nation’s
flood defence. The document states that the primary task of pre-
cautionary flood defence measures is to protect the territory
against flooding caused by overland flow (caused by intensive
rain or snow thaw), river flooding, and the rise of ground water
over the surface.
Document 4: Act No. 7/2010 regarding Flood Defence.
The implementation of the EU Directive 2007/60EC regarding
flood risk assessment and management in the SR’s legal
system was performed via Act No. 7/2010 regarding flood
defence. Paragraph 4, Article 2, states preventive flood defence
measures, which include
(1) measures that slow down run-off from the basin into
streams, increase retention capacity of the basin, or
support natural accumulation of water in suitable localities
and those that protect the territory against flooding by
surface run-off;
(2) measures that reduce the maximum flood discharge, such
as the construction, maintenance, repair, and reconstruction
of engineering structures and polders;
(3) measures that protect the territory against river flooding,
such as channel adjustments and the construction, mainten-
ance, repair, and reconstruction of dikes and flood defence
lines along streams;
(4) measures that protect the territory against flooding by
internal waters, such as construction, maintenance, repair,
and reconstruction facilities for pumping out the internal
waters;
(5) measures that ensure the discharge capacity of a channel,
such as the removal of silt and bank vegetation;
(6) preparation and updating of flood risk management plans
including the preliminary flood risk assessment, flood
hazard maps, and flood risk maps;
(7) preparation and updating of flood plans;
(8) operation of a flood forecasting service;
(9) operation of flood inspections; and
(10) other preventive and flood risk reduction measures.
In each document, flood protection is stressed, which aims to
reduce flooding by the construction of new, and the maintenance
of old, protecting dikes and polders, the adjustment of channels
and the maintenance of re-pumping stations, or by small techni-
cal structures. None of the documents pay attention to the strat-
egies and measures aimed at reducing the flood vulnerability of
social, economic, and environmental systems of communes or
strategies and measure how to mitigate the consequences of
floods, which play an important role in integrated flood risk man-
agement. Nevertheless, in Document 1, some consideration is
given to strategies mitigating the impacts of flooding by
running flood forecasting and warning systems. The integrated
conceptual framework of flood risk assessment and management
of the EU Directive 2007/60EC was degraded to one of flood
defence measures in Document 4. Thus, we can conclude that
the documents making up the current legislative and operational
framework of flood protection do not pay sufficient attention to
integrated flood risk management and that the engineering
approach continues to form the core of flood protection in the SR.
4 The negative features of the engineering approach to
flood risk assessment and management
The technical measures are moreover considered in the case of an
integrated approach and therefore general objection against their
building takes into account the negative influence of structures
on environment is justifiable but is not primary. The critical
key remarks against engineering flood assessment and manage-
ment refer to a philosophy of understanding flood risk as a
 Recent Slovak flood protection relative to integrated flood risk management
flood hazard only which engenders flood management aimed
mainly at protecting territory against flood by technical struc-
tures having certain safety standards and its exclusive and
uniform application over the entire nation of Slovakia. The regu-
lation No. 313/2010 designates different safety standards for
diverse landscapes. The flow capacity of the trough or the
effect of the dam or dike must be greater than the estimated
maximum discharge with an average time of recurrence:
(1) once every 100 years, for the continuous residential zones,
historical preserves, and the areas with the economic activi-
ties of superregional significance;
(2) once every 50 years, for the dispersed housing, areas of
economic activities of regional significance, and areas with
continuous cottage construction; and
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(3) once every 10 years, for the areas with the economic activi-
ties of the local importance
The application of this philosophy is accompanied by a
number of negative phenomena in relation to the assessment
and management of flood risk. Some of these are now
considered.
4.1 Consequences of application of engineering approach to
flood risk assessment
The first accompanying phenomenon of flood risk assessment is
the fact that the assessment of flood hazards is focused only on
the threat, which is caused by the overflowing of rivers on the
floodplains. Flood hazards are expressed only on the basis of
probability of flooding. Other types of flood hazards due, for
example, to the incidence of infiltration excess or saturation over-
land flow causing flood damage to locations outside of the flood-
plain are not taken into account. This type of flood hazard is
subject to basin’s attributes and expresses flood hazard potential
or disposition to floods (Weingartner et al. 2003).
The second negative phenomenon is that vulnerability is
understood only as the exposure of objects to flooding.
However, there is an absence of the vulnerability evaluation,
which is based on the basis of the properties of the objects of
the social, economic, and environmental system, which
expresses their susceptibility to damage, suffering, physical,
and psychological injury, and the ability to cope with the nega-
tive consequences of the floods. The resistance of the object
against damage and suffering the injury causes can mean that
despite the flooding, the flood risk (expected damage) is
minimum.
The third phenomenon is that the result of flood risk assess-
ment means that only one group of municipalities, which have
river reaches with a potentially significant flood risk, is ident-
ified. However, a consistent classification system of flood risk
of all the municipalities of the SR is more required. Processing
each knowledge about the factors related to controlling a poten-
tial of flood hazards and vulnerability of the all municipalities in
467
a systematic way (e.g. by classification based on logical prin-
ciples or numerical algorithms) produces a more detailed classi-
fication system in which municipalities are classified into several
classes of a flood risk in an exhausted manner.
4.2 Consequences of application of engineering approach to
flood risk management
In relation to flood risk management, the first negative phnome-
non is that the exclusive and uniform application of flood protec-
tion based only on technical structures is financial demand and it
suffers from a lack of public financial resources in the long term.
The construction of new objects for flood protection as well as
the maintenance of existing buildings is financially challenging.
The majority of existing reservoirs and levees were primarily
built in the post-war period, and their age is estimated to be
more than 50 years old (Bednárová and Miščı́k 2011). As a
result of fatigue and the ageing of materials as well as the influ-
ence of climate factors, the cost of their maintenance will
increase (Bednárová and Miščı́k 2011). However, the financial
support from public resources is inadequate. Only E91 million
has been earmarked by the government of the SR for the
period 2010– 2015. The lack of funds was already obvious in
2001 – 2010. The flood defence programme in that period
counted on investments funded by public resources to the
amount of E611 million. In reality, investments in construction
were only E181 million (Government of the SR 2010). This pro-
blematic funding of flood defence with public resources means
that the flood protection of many places does not solve and the
possible risk of breach or overflowing increases (a vast breach
of the levee occurred on the River Ondava in 2010).
The second phenomenon is that building construction of flood
protection is cost-effective only in cases where the cost of
implementation is less than the amount of the estimated possible
flood damage. For this reason, flood protection focuses primarily
on cities with a high concentration of population and economic
activities, which are usually located in the vicinity of the big
and medium-sized watercourses. Flood protection of small vil-
lages located along the small watercourses thus receives very
little attention.
The third accompanying feature is the idea that the govern-
ment and its organizations are only responsible for flood protec-
tion, which suppresses public awareness of flood risk and
individual responsibility for the mitigation of flood damages.
The engineering approach to flood defence and its implemen-
tation via the governmental organization (Slovak Water Manage-
ment Enterprise – SWME) give the idea that this organization
has the obligation to defend the public against floods. For
example, the SWME administers and maintains the majority of
streams in Slovakia (total length of stream is 38,217 km) as
well as 3135 km of protecting dikes and 277 water reservoirs.
Cases in which the municipality takes over from the SWME to
administrate the streams flowing through its territory are very
 468 Ľubomı́r Solı́n
rare. On the other hand, there are many examples of bad land use,
illegal dumping in river basins, devastated areas abandoned after
logging, and keeping inappropriate materials on river banks, etc.,
which diminish the cross-section profiles and can block culverts
and passages under bridges. This subsequently produces an
undesirable concentration of surface run-off that causes
impoundment followed by a local overflow.
Furthermore, the government is also expected to participate in
the indemnification of damage caused by flooding to the proper-
ties of people. However, the role of the SR government in
decreasing the negative consequences of flooding and in restor-
ing the social, economic, and environmental systems in a terri-
tory stricken by flood is only partially defined in law. The
government is obliged to reimburse expenses that are incurred
in connection with safeguarding and rescue activities. In contrast
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to some countries (Fuchs 2009, Holub and Fuchs 2009), the role
of the government in the indemnification of damage caused by
flooding to the property of self-administration, individuals, and
companies is not defined in Slovakia’s legal system. Partial com-
pensation for damage is ascertained on a case-by-case basis, after
each individual flood event, and is paid from the Prime Minis-
ter’s Reserve. As far as the property of the self-administrations
is concerned (damaged local communications, water mains, sew-
erage, and water cleansing stations), such compensation varies
between 0% and 80%. As far as the compensation of damage
caused by flooding to persons is concerned, in 2010, for
example, a total of E2,841,800 was paid. The amount of com-
pensation per household varies between E300 and E1300
(depending on the scope of the damage and the social situation
of the household).
Very important is the dramatic decrease in the interest of the
population in insuring their property against flooding. From pol-
icies active in 2002, only 58% were still in force in 2011 (Solı́n
et al. 2013). Presumably, one of the rational reasons for such an
evident decrease in the number of policies observed in the last
10 years may be the negative experience of people who have
insurance claim payments. They often do not cover the cost
necessary for the recovery after flood damage. Another reason
for the decreasing demand of flood insurance can be associated
with the worsening of the financial situation of Slovakia’s popu-
lation. According to the latest data from the Statistical Office of
the Slovak Republic, up to 76, 4% of households have difficulties
with paying the usual expenditure.
5. How integrated flood risk assessment and management
can eliminate accompaniments of engineering approach
We illustrate this by comparing two examples of preliminary
flood risk assessment at a national scale. In the first example,
which represents engineering approach, the preliminary flood
risk assessment was undertaken by SWME (2011) in the frame-
work of the EU Directive 2007/60EC. A second example is the
preliminary assessment of flood risk in municipalities near
headwater basins, which is based on an integrated approach
according to Solı́n et al. (2014).
EU Directive 2007/60EC states that the preliminary flood
risk assessment is based on available or readily derivable infor-
mation on floods, and the attributes of basins, populations, and
economic activity to provide an assessment of potential risk.
The according report elaborated by SWME shows that the
assessment of significant potential risk is primarily aimed at
evaluating the state of the river reaches in municipalities
which are critical with regard to their ability to transport the dis-
charge of the specified probability of occurrence. The result of
the preliminary flood risk assessment drawn up consists of a list
of 551 river reaches with a potentially significant flood risk. The
selection of river reaches was based on empirical knowledge,
which SWME gained through their activity as manager of the
water courses in Slovakia. The length of the river reaches is
in the range of 0.3 – 14.9 km, and they are located in 493 muni-
cipalities, making up 17% of the total number of municipalities
in Slovakia. The centroids of municipalities in which river
reaches with a potentially significant flood risk were identified
are shown in Figure 1. With regard to the management of
floods, As Ič (2013) reported that the technical flood control
measures, such an adjustment channel water courses, construc-
tion of a protective dam, water reservoirs, and polders, are
required to get floods under control.
The result of the integrated approach to the preliminary flood
risk assessment of municipalities in headwater basins is shown in
Figure 2. The municipalities are visualized through polygons
(cadastral boundaries of municipalities). In this case, the aim
of preliminary flood risk assessment is to identify the spatial
(regional) variability of flood risk and thus to create a rational
basis for its further detailed assessment and management.
Figure 2 is the result of flood risk assessment, which is a combi-
nation of the flood hazards of municipalities (Solı́n 2008, 2011),
the social vulnerability of the inhabitants of the municipalities
(Solı́n 2012), and their ability to restore flood-damaged property
(Solı́n et al. 2013). The flood hazard in headwater basins is
understood as a potential – that is, the disposition of the basin
to suffer from flood – which is influenced by attributes of the
headwater basins and manifests itself as the frequency of flood
events in municipalities. In the basins with less permeable
soils, flood events are more frequent than in basins in which per-
meable soils prevail (Solı́n 2008). The vulnerability of municipa-
lities was characterized by the following proxy variables: the
materials the houses were built from and the period in which
they were built; the age structure of the population; ethnicity;
family structure; and the category of the house. The ability for
recovery after floods was expressed by flood insurance rates in
these municipalities. The result of the preliminary flood risk
assessment, achieved on the basis of a combination of the afore-
mentioned factors, is the classification of 1876 municipalities in
small river basins into five ordinal classes of flood risk. For each
class, it is possible to design the optimal strategy of flood risk
management.
 Recent Slovak flood protection relative to integrated flood risk management 469

Engineering and an integrated approach to the preliminary evaluation. The overlay of Figures 1 and 2 in ArcGIS shows
flood risk assessment pursue different objectives and apply that of the 493 municipalities in which river segments with
different criteria, which are then reflected in the results of the potential significant flood risk were identified by SWME
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Figure 1 Engineering assessment of the flood risk of municipalities in headwater basins by SWME (2011).

Figure 2 Integrated assessment of the flood risk of municipalities in headwater basins (Solı́n et al. 2013).
 470 Ľubomı́r Solı́n
Table 2 Classification of municipalities with significant potential flood risk in headwater basins (SWME 2011) into classes of flood risk according to
Solı́n et al. (2013)
Number of Mean of standardized
Class of flood risk municipalities values of flood hazard
Very low 34 0.39
Low 57 0.57
Medium 78 0.72
High 49 0.91
Very high 34 1.00
(2011), 252 municipalities are located in headwater basins and
their flood risk assessment has been also done by integrated
approach (Solı́n et al. 2013). A comparison of these two
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approaches of flood risk assessment shows that 252 communities
with potential significant flood risk do not form one category in
terms of integrated flood risk assessment, but their level of flood
risk is significantly differentiated (Table 2). In the table, are also
shown arithmetic averages of standardized values components of
flood risk, that is, flood hazard, vulnerability, and level of insur-
ance for the individual classes of flood risk together with the
arithmetic averages of the flood events in the period 1996 –
2012 in various classes of flood risk. From this mutual compari-
son of the results of the flood risk assessment, the question arises
of whether dealing with flood risk management, the implemen-
tation of the costly technical flood protection measures in all vil-
lages, which, according to SWME, have a significant flood risk
potential, is really necessary and meaningful? Integrated flood
risk assessment clearly indicates that it is not the case.
Integrated flood risk management is a combination of strat-
egies aimed at reducing the extent of flooding, reducing vulner-
ability, and mitigating negative flood consequences (Table 1).
The extent to which the various strategies are applied depends
on the level of flood risk and its structure. With increasing
levels of flood risk, the management emphasis will move from
a strategy to mitigate the negative consequences of flooding
towards a strategy to reduce the vulnerability and the extent of
flooding. For example, in villages with a very low to low flood
risk, it is sufficient to focus on flood risk management activities
which contribute to consistently maintaining a situation of low
flood risk (e.g. education on the occurrence of floods and on
the importance of individual responsibility for the emergence
of local factors which give rise to flooding). In municipalities
with a medium level of flood risk, there is the rational manage-
ment of flood risk in addition to the activities referred to in the
previous case, to raise awareness of flood risk, increase individ-
ual responsibility for mitigating the damage caused by flooding,
and to reduce the local factors which accelerate the formation of
surface run-off. Structural measures reducing flooding would
have been at the core of management in municipalities with a
high level of flood risk.
These two examples of preliminary flood risk assessment
show that the result of the preliminary integrated flood risk
Mean of standardized Mean of standardized Mean of flood
values of vulnerability values of flood insurance events frequency
0.27 0.55 1.24
0.29 0.63 2.39
0.34 0.68 2.18
0.35 0.69 2.51
0.35 0.86 2.79
assessment is so much more an effective basis for rational
decision-making on the management of flood risks than engin-
eering assessment. The spatial differentiation of levels of flood
risk assessment enables the application of a spatially differen-
tiated optimal strategy for flood risk management plans. To
some extent, it allows for the reduction of the financial
demands of flood risk management. The integrated approach
deals with the assessment of flood risk in an exhaustive
manner (i.e. all villages in headwater basins are subject to assess-
ment). This creates a rational basis for increasing public aware-
ness of flood risk and strengthening individual responsibility
for the mitigation of the negative impacts of floods and involves
all corresponding stakeholders in the decision-making process
on reducing flood risk.
6 Final remarks
An analysis of documents on flood defence approved by the gov-
ernment and parliament of the SR shows that flood protection
continues to be based on the traditional engineering approach
and aims to reduce flooding by building financially demanding
technical structures. The change from engineering to integrated
flood risk management first requires the authorities responsible
for flood risk management to shift their understanding of flood
risk from a single-dimensioned flood risk, which is reduced to
flood hazards, to a multidimensional one as a combination of
flood hazard and vulnerability of society. A change in the under-
standing of flood risk is very important because it will bring a
change in assessment and management of flood risk. Instead of
an ability-based assessment of river reaches to transport specific
discharges, the place-based flood risk assessment taking into
account the flood hazard and flood vulnerability of economic,
social, and environmental systems of place should be carried
out. The core of integrated flood risk management consists of
the suggestion that the optimal flood management strategy
reflects the spatial variability of flood risk.
An integrated approach, in addition to water managers and
hydrologists, increases the role of experts from the geographical,
economic, and environmental sciences and stakeholders in flood
risk assessment and management. This multidisciplinary aspect
of flood risk assessment and its integrated management require
 Recent Slovak flood protection relative to integrated flood risk management
a redefinition of the role of the SWME, which is so far only
responsible for flood risk assessment and management. This is
a task for the Ministry of Environment of the SR. A strong tra-
dition of engineering approach, however, suggests that it will
be a lengthy process. Nevertheless, it is the role of the scientific
community to present examples of the integrated flood risk
assessment at the national, regional, and local scales for support-
ing rational decision-making on a management of flood risk.
In the framework of integrated flood risk assessment was
taken into account in particular the impact of the factors involved
in spatial (regional) variability of flood risk. An important aspect
of the flood risk is also its temporal variability caused by climate
change and changes in land use/land cover. Although we have
not addressed this aspect of integrated flood risk assessment
and management, we realize its importance. Several studies
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suggest that climate change along with changes in land use/
land cover cause non-stationarity of annual maximum discharges
(Milly et al. 2008, Ishak et al. 2013). This obviously affects both
assessment and management of flood risks. Non-stationarity
causes a change in the parameters of probability distribution
functions of the annual maximum discharges. Consequently, it
is necessary to adjust the estimates of the maximum discharges
for the specified probability and safety standards of water struc-
tures. This change in flood hazard will have to take into account
the integrated approach flood risk assessment, too. However,
coping with the effects of climate change on flood risk is likely
to further highlight in flood risk management the importance
of reducing the vulnerability and increasing the resilience of
social, economic, and environmental system.
Acknowledgment
I would like to particularly thank the unknown reviewers for their stimu-
lating comments.
Funding
This article is one of the outputs of the 2/0091 Project Flood Risk of
Municipalities in Slovakia, accomplished with the financial support of
the VEGA Grant Agency.
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