Climate change adaptation

It's not always a great idea to acknowledge that bad things can create opportunities – but they can. Bad things cause suffering and tragedy, but they can also destabilise the status quo, open space for new discussions, and give an impetus to groups looking for positive change.

Programmes which transfer money directly to the poor help them adapt to climate change. That´s what I´m suggesting in a new briefing paper to be presented at the upcoming conference on ‘Social Protection for Social Justice’, will be held at the Centre for Social Protection in Brighton between the 13th and 15th of April. 

In our field visit to Kundar Para village of Gaibandha District, Joy Guillemot from the World Health Organization asked local women to share impacts of floods on their health and that of their children. The group of around 25 women all started replying simultaneously, surprising me and the other observers with their strong feelings!

There has been growing interest in measuring progress in climate change adaptation. This has partly been driven by the Bali Action Plan adopted at the Conference of Parties 13, which stressed the need for prioritising and incentivising adaptation actions. Without knowing how effective adaptation actions are it is impossible to prioritise and incentivise them.

Visiting rural communities in Bangladesh has always been like ‘homecoming’ for me. But I seem to learn something new every time I visit. This time was no different. I, along with 25+ participants of the Fifth Conference on community-based adaptation (CBA5), visited the Gopalgang area in southern Bangladesh. Historically, the Gopalgang area is highly vulnerable to disasters, like flooding and water logging.

This question was asked by a participant during a debrief from our field trip to Chapai Nawabganj district - a drought affected area north west of Dhaka, close to India.

Witnessing children in rural areas marching in parades to commemorate Bangladeshi Independence Day on 26 March was a beautiful sight that filled my heart with joy. And my three-day visit to various communities in the Rajshahi District gave insights into Bangladeshi society. But it also gave us an indication of how climate adaptation programmes will have to penetrate a landscape of entrenched social injustice and feudalism. Will climate adaptation in such circumstances merely be old wine in new bottles, or could it mean a real paradigm shift in development that will help poor people to take the future into their own hands?

A field trip to a mangrove island near the Bay of Bengal highlights the determination and creativity of local communities in adapting to climate change.