Floods

We were in Da Loc commune, a sleepy part of Vietnam’s Thanh Hoa province. It’s a place that on a single day witnessed both the fury and the protective power of nature.

The floods this year in Thailand have been unprecedented. Floods have now entered  parts of Bangkok, the country’s capital city, and the fate of the rest of the city hangs in the balance.  An extraordinary volume of water – more than 10,000 million cubic metres –  somehow needs to get from Thailand’s central plains to the sea, with Bangkok standing in the way.

A field trip to Gaibandha District in Bangladesh uncovers a plethora of strategies used by local communities to cope with flooding and river bank erosion.

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.

The annual international conferences on community-based adaptation are unique in that they include field trips where participants can see for themselves how vulnerable people are coping with climate-change related impacts. I went on my field visit on Saturday (26 March) — to a site in Manikganj District, about three hours from Dhaka city in Bangladesh.

Asking poor households how much they would be willing to pay to protect a river in Thailand can help put a tangible price-tag on the river’s benefits — from clean water to flood control — and realistically assess the costs of overexploitation and degradation.