Together We Stand

[ 66 ] Action in community resilience to fight floods in Bangladesh Saba Mahmood, Muhtari Aminu-Kano and Martin Cottingham, Islamic Relief B angladesh is at the top of a league table it would rather not be associated with. This low-lying nation has been rated the most vulnerable in the world due to the negative consequences of climate change, and is one of the most vulnerable to natural disasters. The entire country is an extensive delta formed by the Ganges, Brahmaputra and Meghna rivers. Its history is a catalogue of widespread monsoon flooding, earthquakes and devastating tropical cyclones. To the south is the Bay of Bengal, where rising sea levels are blighting coastal areas with a combination of waterlogging and salt contamination that is crippling agricul- ture and making groundwater undrinkable. To the north are the Himalayas, where the melting of the mountain glaciers threat- ens more intense flooding in the shorter term and widespread drought as the century advances. Islamic Relief operates in 12 of the 64 districts of Bangladesh. Its priority areas are determined by a ‘vulnerability matrix’ that weighs up poverty levels and measures the extent of vulnerability to floods, cyclones and tidal surges. One such priority area is Gaibanda, 300 kilometres to the north west of Dhaka and home to over 2.1 million people. It is a district plagued by monsoon floods, river bank erosion and unseasonal cold snaps. The moods and movements of the local rivers can make or break the livelihoods of the most marginalized such as those who live in the char lands, outside the embankments that offer a measure of flood protection to only 40 per cent of the district. Chars are islands of silt and sand deposited by the river; they may be permanent enough to sustain whole communities for years in the fertile flood plain but can also be so transitory that they are inundated and rendered uninhabitable in a single rainy season. Many who live in the char lands have been displaced Image: Martin Cottingham - Islamic Relief Syed Shahnawaz Ali of IRB receiving the Sasakawa Award for disaster risk reduction on behalf of NARRI Bangladesh T ogether W e S tand