Climate and Development Lab
Connect with the CDL on Twitter:
  • Home
  • About
    • Authors
    • Alumni
  • CDL in the News
  • Publications
    • Scholarly Articles & Chapters
    • Policy Briefings
    • Books & Special Issues
    • Submissions to the UNFCCC
  • Projects
  • Multimedia
  • Contact

Helping tomorrow's climate refugees by engaging today: A dispatch from Bangladesh 

1/13/2016

 
By Timmons Roberts
Picture
I spent the past week in Bangladesh, visiting the countryside on a fascinating and heartening trip from the country’s massive capital, Dhaka, to the south, a region being hammered by climate change. I came to give some speeches and took the opportunity to see for myself how foreign aid and local sweat and equity are being used to fight the rising seas in a country so low that 30 million people may become refugees. For them to secure a livelihood in their home places, the developed countries need to be engaged, with our resources, our hands, and our minds. We simply cannot afford not to be here.
After being asked for years to come, I’d finally made the trip to attend the 2nd annual Gobeshona conference, a gathering of researchers seeking to understand the reality and best policy and actions Bangladesh and other vulnerable countries can take in the face of rising seas, intensified cyclones, saltwater intrusion, fatal heat waves, and droughts. Bangladesh, with its 180 million people living on an ancient river delta, is extremely vulnerable to climate change, and has become a national laboratory for how we all are going to cope. As Dr. Saleemul Huq, who leads the International Centre for Climate Change and Development (ICCCAD) and is a world leader on adaptation, puts it, “if you want to see what climate change looks like, and more importantly, what tackling it looks like, you must come to Bangladesh. What will happen to the rest of the world tomorrow is already happening there today. The rest of the world can therefore learn from Bangladesh how to tackle the problem.”  

In 2015 we saw how the influx of 1 million refugees from Syria has challenged the whole European Union system, and taxed resources and cultures across the region to keep their doors open. Imagine the disruption that might come from 30 or 300 million climate refugees if emissions are not controlled and poor nations’ needs are not addressed. Migrants are likely to follow past patterns of movement. First, they will try stay in their homelands, and if they have to move, they will seek to move to cities as close as possible to their homes, so they can remain in touch. When they get to cities, they will be forced to live in shantytowns and other “irregular settlements,” in shacks often built on precarious land in floodplains, subject to mudslides, extreme heat, and unsanitary conditions. They will be forced to work in the informal sector, earning pennies and living hand-to-mouth. Once uprooted, further disruption then can send them on to other cities or countries.

A slow-moving humanitarian crisis
I met a neighborhood of people in Khulna, a sprawling coastal zone city that has absorbed displaced people from Bangladesh’s coastal zone. Their fields are made worthless by saltwater flooding, with their wells now often too salty to drink or use for irrigation or watering animals. Tin shacks with dirt floors were packed together in one tiny piece of land they rented, with 20 families sharing cooking facilities, a water tap, and washing place.

In this way, they had adapted to climate change, in a common way that humans have throughout history: they moved and reinvented themselves in a new place. The men learned how to pull rickshaws in the savage traffic, heat, pollution, and dust of Khulna, earning a scant living through long shifts that run from morning until late at night. Some of the women have secured low-paying jobs as domestic servants for families of more means, cleaning, cooking, and caring for children. If they can, they keep in touch with the people who stayed back home, sending money when they can to their elderly parents or spouses to survive.
Migrants also will follow networks of family or friends, to neighborhoods, cities, and across oceans to places where they hear of economic opportunities. We might feel quite distant from Bangladesh, but in today’s world, 7,000 miles and 11 times zones is not an insurmountable barrier: if inequality is high enough, people will find a way to get there. For example, the January 6 edition of the Dhaka Tribune newspaper described how 15 Bangladeshis were found wandering in Nicaragua, having been robbed and abandoned by their smugglers, on their way to the United States.

Hundreds of thousands of Bangladeshis have already made their way to the U.S. and Europe, and more will come, following friends and family and seeking economic opportunity. And of course there are the other low-lying and drought-prone countries with hundreds of millions more of the climate vulnerable. Building and fortifying walls along our borders will simply not stop them: they will take to the waters, tunnels, or the air. This is not new. What is new is the potential scale of the “push” factors, and the preventability of this slow-moving humanitarian crisis.

There are two parts to addressing this crisis-in-the-making. First, we risk sending the global climate system into uncertain levels of destabilization if we do not urgently transform our economies away from fossil fuels. The Paris climate agreement set an aspirational goal of staying near 1.5 degrees Celsius of warming, an absolutely critical focus of negotiators from the poorest and most vulnerable countries, like Bangladesh. Above that level, uncertain and very disruptive climate impacts will be set in motion. We probably need to get to zero net emissions in the wealthy nations by 2030 to stay under 1.5 degrees, with the rapidly developing nations following us by 2040, and the least developed nations by 2050. These are stunningly ambitious targets, requiring a wartime mobilization.

The other side is adaptation. I visited villages where farmers were switching from flooded field rice agriculture to prawn and fish aquaculture, raising low levees and wading into the muddy ponds every few months to collect baskets of the eight inch long crustaceans, which are sold for export and local markets. Around the ponds they grew their eggplants, tomatoes, bananas, mangos, and their goats, chickens, cows, and pigs grazed nearby. I tasted fruits I’d never heard of from trees shading their tidy villages, stepping around tarps where rice and fruits dried in the sun, as were rows of sticks covered with cow dung, for cooking fuel. They used everything, and every inch of the land was stunningly productive. 

To stay there, however, many villages need to adapt to rising waters. My trip was led by ICCCAD, the climate adaptation experts, along with their local partner organization. We saw one village where all the land had been raised to stay dry in the next flood, with special raised houses, latrines, and chicken coops. They have built a floodwall against the river’s rise, and their roads still need to be raised. The villagers felt better about their likelihood of surviving the next flood, but one old woman told us that “we raised the land, but the waters keep rising. So how do we know we’ve raised things enough?”

Stepping up U.S. engagement with Bangladesh
Obviously, we don’t know how to fully adapt to climate change, but these kinds of efforts—switching to more climate resilient livelihoods, raising houses, latrines, and roads, mobilizing new technologies to take salt out of groundwater for drinking and farm use—all need to be developed and scaled up rapidly. Bangladesh is among the cutting-edge nations working on that, but there are similar efforts around the world.
The U.S. and other developed nations need to actively support these efforts, with research and support given to efforts that work. Our funding should be both direct, through “bilateral” agencies like USAID, and through “multilateral” ones, like the Green Climate Fund, created under the United Nations. The Obama administration has quietly supported this work, but much more is needed.

Congress needs to lead, follow, or get out of the way in scaling up adaptation finance. Otherwise, they bear their part of the responsibility for the waves of climate migrants coming to our shores and potentially destabilizing countries in Africa, the Middle East, South and East Asia. (The same can be said, of course, about the need for them to support efforts to avoid the worst impacts of climate change in the only long-term way possible: by sharply reducing our emissions and being leaders in global efforts to cooperate in solving this crisis.)
​
One final point: USAID has plans to spend $30 million in Bangladesh for climate adaptation work here. This is crucial work, and USAID is already making a difference here. This work is hugely important diplomacy. But USAID is barely able to do its job here. In what I perceive to be an overreaction to security concerns, USAID and U.S. State Department staff are highly confined in their movements. They are essentially locked in their living quarters and offices in the sprawling red-brick and razor-wired U.S. Embassy compound, which tellingly looks like a medium-security prison. The prisoners, of course, are our representatives, unable to get out into the community to build partnerships, check on the progress of our aid projects, and keep America popular among Bangladeshis. Their families are being increasingly segregated and separated from local people. Replacing staff has grown nearly impossible in this stifling context.

Perhaps there is a post-Benghazi reason for this fear, but it is self-defeating if our goal is to build goodwill and help this dynamic nation continue to move forward. I was quite stunned by the buzz of economic activity in Bangladesh—the wheels of production and commerce are turning on every inch of land. Poverty and sanitation and education have improved by leaps and bounds since the country’s founding just 45 years ago. With this dynamism, creativity, and resources, Bangladesh can handle a lot of climate change, and economic change. But it needs our engagement. Fear is a self-defeating response. Let our American staff be our ambassadors. Send out the Peace Corps volunteers. Fund Americans in working with local and international organizations addressing Bangaldesh’s needs. Get the student exchanges going, and the elder exchanges. Indeed, the only response to self-defeating fear is courage, engagement, and working together to address the existential problem that is climate change.
Originally published on the Brookings Blog

Comments are closed.
    Tweets by @ClimateDevLab
    CDL in the News

    28 Dec 2018 - Edwards in the NYT on electric vehicles in Latin America

    24 Dec 2018 - The Public's Radio RI interviews Roberts on how the fossil fuel industry outspends environmental groups on campaign contributions & lobbying

    19 Dec 2018 - EcoRI News: New Report Claims RI Climate Council Falling Behind Targets

    17 Dec 2018 - 'We must move beyond business as usual,' says new report on Rhode Island's inadequate climate plan.

    12 Dec 2018 - 
    Isabel Cavelier, Guy Edwards and Lina Puerto “COP25 en 2019: reto y oportunidad para elevar la ambición climática en América Latina” El Espectador

    4 Dec 2018 - Whitehouse, Ciciline meet with climate lab

    28 Nov 2018 - Edwards quoted in New York Times story on Brazil backing out of hosting UN summit on climate change

    11 Oct 2018 - Brookings Institute Climate reality requires starting at home: Weaning from fossil fuels

    23 Sep 2018 - Edwards quoted in Financial Times on Argentina energy future

    13 Jul 2018 - Europe and Latin America can blaze a trail on implementing the Paris Agreement
    ​
    1 Jun 2018 - Brookings Institute One year since Trump's withdrawal from the Paris climate agreement

    21 May 2018 - Edwards article in World Politics Review: Is the G-20 Heading for a Showdown With Trump on Climate Change?

    11 May 2018 - Edwards Op-Ed in Washington Post 

    22 Jan 2018 - Roberts Op-Ed The climate solution no-one in Davos will be talking about

    ​15 Dec 2017 - Edwards' article on how Regional and domestic politics could sabotage Brazil's bid to host UN climate change talks in 2019 ​
    ​
    8 Nov 2017 - Roberts quoted in Reuters story on financing loss and damage

    9 Oct 2017 - EcoRI article describes Roberts' testimony against the natural gas power plant proposed for construction in Burrillville, Rhode Island

    17 Sep 2017 - BBC Radio 5 featured a live interview with Roberts about Trump's conditions for staying in Paris

    4 Sep 2017 - Roberts comments on the use of his work in a report by Rhode Island Department of Health on the proposed power plant in Burrillville, Rhode Island 

    17 Jul 2017 - Roberts mentioned in NPR's story on the US having a say in UN climate spending
    ​
    15 Jul 2017 - Roberts calls for solid climate policies in RI

    5 Jul 2017 - Roberts demands swifter action on CO2 release

    5 Jul 2017 - Roberts demands RI Governor Raimondo to take climate action

    30 Jun 2017 - Roberts gives advice on owning and using electric cars

    23 Jun 2017 - Roberts comments on how voters are persuaded by the terms 'climate change' and 'global warming'

    20 Jun 2017 - Roberts' involvement in local climate group is helping to fight fossil fuel development

    3 Jun 2017 - WPRO Radio's Steve Klamkin interviews Roberts on the Paris Agreement

    2 Jun 2017 - Roberts comments on US involvement in the Green Climate Fund

    2 Jun 2017 - BBC Radio 5's Faye Rusco interviews Roberts on Trump's withdrawal from Paris

    2 Jun 2017 - Roberts discusses the role of mayors and private sector companies post US pull-out of Paris

    1 Jun 2017 - Roberts gives more details about the US withdrawal from the Paris Agreement

    1 Jun 2017 - Roberts organizes emergency protest in RI

    1 Jun 2017 - Roberts comments on the implications of US withdrawal from the Paris Agreement

    1 Jun 20117 - Roberts share his views on the US exit from the Paris Accord

    31 May 2017 - Roberts cited on the far-reaching implications of US withdrawal from the Paris Agreement

    31 May 2017 - RI left vulnerable if US pulls out of Paris Accord, says Roberts

    24 May 2017 - Roberts chimes in on Trump's proposed EPA budget

    30 Apr 2017 - Roberts helps to 'fact check' Trump's first 100 days in office

    25 Apr 2017 - Roberts lobbies for people's march in RI to mark Trump's first 100 days in office

    23 Apr 2017 - Roberts cautions against threats to science at march for science in Rhode Island

    7 Apr 2017 - White House Chronicle's Llewelyn King interviews Roberts on Trump’s executive order and climate policy directions

    10 Mar 2017 - Roberts quoted in Providence Business News about new proposed fossil fuel infrastructure in Rhode Island

    6 Feb 2017 - Devex article on climate finance under the new administration quotes Roberts

    18 Jan 2017 - Roberts featured in NPR Marketplace segment on Obama's $500m donation to the Green Climate Fund

    29 Dec 2016 - Roberts quoted in Common Dreams article about the state of environmental justice in 2016

    19 Nov 2016 - EcoRI profiles Roberts and the new Civic Alliance for a Cooler Rhode Island

    14 Nov 2016 - Roberts featured in Rhode Island Public Radio segment on Trump and the Paris Agreement 

    12 Nov 2016 - Roberts quoted in Climate Home article on Republican plans to defund climate change programs

    10 Nov 2016 - Roberts quote appears in EcoRI article about Trump and the environment 

    9 Nov 2016 - Roberts quoted in InsideClimate News article on COP22 reaction to Trump's election

    9 Nov 2016 - Science Daily discusses new CDL article on paying for loss and damage

    9 Nov 2016 - Roberts quoted in Climate Home article on COP22 reaction to Trump's election

    8 Nov 2016 - Roberts' paper on paying for loss and damage discussed and quoted in Phys.Org

    7 Nov 2016 - Roberts' paper on paying for loss and damage discussed and quoted in Futurity article

    21 Sep 2016 - Roberts quoted in a Breitbart News article about Clinton's support following shift in climate change language

    20 Sep 2016 - Roberts quoted in a Climate Home article on Clinton's language around climate change after Sanders' endorsement

    5 May 2016 – Climate Home quotes Edwards on the announcement that Patricia Espinosa will lead the UNFCCC from this July 

    5 May 2016 - Dialogo Chino quotes Edwards following announcement that Patricia Espinosa will replace Christiana Figueres as head of the UNFCCC

    24 Apr 2016 - Deutsche Welle quotes Edwards on how ratifying Paris Agreement can boost prosperity in Latin America

    23 Mar 2016 – Edwards provides extended quote to Dialogo Chino on Obama’s trip to Cuba and Argentina
     
    25 Dec 2015 -  ConexiónCOP conversó con Guy Edwards sobre el nuevo acuerdo climático y America Latina

    14 Dec 2015 - Rhode Island Public Radio quotes Roberts on how Paris Climate Pact should steer New England toward clean energy

    11 Dec 2015 - Associated Press quotes Romain Weikmans on “Wild West” account on climate finance

    10 Dec 2015 -  Climate Home talks to Roberts about the lack of an independent system on climate finance

    Read more...

    Archives

    December 2021
    November 2021
    October 2021
    June 2021
    January 2021
    December 2019
    December 2018
    October 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    August 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    October 2015
    September 2015
    August 2015
    July 2015
    June 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015
    March 2015
    February 2015
    January 2015
    December 2014
    November 2014
    October 2014
    September 2014
    August 2014
    July 2014
    June 2014
    May 2014
    April 2014
    March 2014
    February 2014
    January 2014
    December 2013
    November 2013
    April 2012
    December 2011
    February 2009
    December 2008

    Authors

    The pieces featured in the blog are authored by CDL members and a diverse group of partners from around the world. The opinions expressed in these articles are the sole responsibility of the authors and do not reflect those of Brown University. 

    Categories

    All
    Civil Society
    Climate Finance
    Conference
    COP17
    COP19
    COP20
    COP21
    Energy
    Equity
    Latin America
    LDCs
    Legislation
    Loss And Damage
    Mitigation
    Policy Brief
    Publications
    Rhode Island
    Small Island Developing States
    UNFCCC
    United States

    RSS Feed

Proudly powered by Weebly