Before the Water Rises: Kinshasa's Flood Intelligence Pilot

Turning local warnings into readiness: ten weeks of field documentation, 134 mapped water assets, and a new flood-forecasting foundation — helping communities act before the water rises.

In Kinshasa, water tells a different story. As one of the fastest-growing cities in the world, and with its rapidly growing population and strained infrastructure, Kinshasa faces mounting pressure on waterways, infrastructure, and communities closest to flood risks.

Community teams working through AlerteUnité spent ten weeks gathering eye-opening findings that exposed an unmistakeable gap: while critical infrastructure does exist, communities and institutions lack shared visibility into condition, usage, climate vulnerability, and maintenance needs. After documenting 134 water assets, the teams identified troubling contamination and flood-risk concerns city-wide, making a solution more urgent than ever.

A forecast can buy time. What communities do with that time changes everything. AlerteUnité has already secured a strong technology foundation, with Google having accepted the initiative into its Flood Forecasting API programme — good news for the pilot, which now has access to river flood forecasting capabilities that could help identify potential flood risks up to seven days in advance.

The platform has also secured approximately USD$64,000 in AWS-supported tech development and implementation support. With the technology foundation in place, the next step is converting it into measurable outcomes on the ground.

With the right capital, AlerteUnité can scale the operations that turn climate intelligence into real-world action — community monitoring teams, flood preparedness campaigns, safe zone management, awareness activities, drills, water asset stewardship, environmental monitoring, and resilience reporting.

Kinshasa opens an investment window few datasets offer: deployment of proven climate technology where reliable ground data doesn't exist — yet. When communities can understand and trust forecasts, they take action before the water rises.

Partnership focus: Flood preparedness, verification, training, stewardship and local leadership — community monitoring teams, preparedness campaigns, safe zone management, awareness activities, drills, water asset stewardship, environmental monitoring and resilience reporting.