In the northern Ganga plains floods are common and constitute a major cause of the poverty endemic to the region. The largest investment governments have made in response to the risk of flooding has been in structural measures such as embankments and spurs. The relative costs and benefits of building embankments are widely debated but have never been systematically evaluated. Alternative strategies for managing floods also exist, but no cost-benefit analysis of such interventions has been undertaken either.

The purpose of this paper is to present the results of a systematic qualitative analysis of the costs and benefits of constructing embankments in the lower Bagmati River basin, which stretches across the Nepal Tarai and into northern Bihar.

The analysis suggests that constructing embankments and spurs for flood control in the Ganga basin has different implications for different groups. Also, the role embankments play in flood mitigation provides a useful vantage point for exploring the link between the impacts of climate change and disaster risk reduction.

Furthermore, the paper analyses of the costs and benefits of both structural flood control measures, and a wide array of local, "people-centered" strategies. These strategies range from the planting of forest buffers to the raising of houses and villages, development of early warning systems and the expansion of existing local strategies (such as the provision of boats) for coping with floods. The investigation indicates that the costs of current structural approaches have exceeded their benefits.

The effectiveness of the approaches to flood risk management or climate change impacts will change significantly. The paper concludes that structural measures cannot be an effective primary strategy for responding to the increased flood risk anticipated as a consequence of climate change. In contrast, the benefits of people-centered interventions appear relatively resilient to the impacts of climate change.