People move a boat in a flooded area in Sylhet, northeast Bangladesh [File: Reuters]
The worst floods in Bangladesh in more than a century have killed dozens of people so far and displaced nearly 4 million people, with authorities warning the water levels would remain dangerously high in the north this week.
Experts say the catastrophic rain-triggered floods, which submerged large part of the country’s northern and northeastern areas, are an outcome of climate change.
Bangladesh, a densely populated delta nation, is also one of the world’s most climate-vulnerable where the poor are disproportionately impacted as frequent floods threaten livelihoods, agriculture, infrastructure and clean water supply.
A 2015 study by the World Bank Institute said about 3.5 million of Bangladesh’s 160 million people are at risk of river flooding every year.
Saiful Islam, director of the Institute of Water and Flood Management (IWFM) at the Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology (BUET), analysed 35 years of flooding data and found that rains were getting more unpredictable and many rivers are rising above dangerous levels more frequently than before.
“The last seven years alone brought five major floods, eroding people’s capacity to adapt, especially in the country’s northern and northeastern regions,” Islam told Al Jazeera.
Citing one of his research papers, he said even if average global temperatures increase modestly – by 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 Fahrenheit) over the average for pre-industrial times – flooding along the Brahmaputra river basin in northeastern India and Bangladesh is projected to increase by 24 percent. Aljazeera - link - Faisal Mahmud - link - more like this (climate change) - link - more like this (South Asia) - link
Experts say the catastrophic rain-triggered floods, which submerged large part of the country’s northern and northeastern areas, are an outcome of climate change.
Bangladesh, a densely populated delta nation, is also one of the world’s most climate-vulnerable where the poor are disproportionately impacted as frequent floods threaten livelihoods, agriculture, infrastructure and clean water supply.
A 2015 study by the World Bank Institute said about 3.5 million of Bangladesh’s 160 million people are at risk of river flooding every year.
Saiful Islam, director of the Institute of Water and Flood Management (IWFM) at the Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology (BUET), analysed 35 years of flooding data and found that rains were getting more unpredictable and many rivers are rising above dangerous levels more frequently than before.
“The last seven years alone brought five major floods, eroding people’s capacity to adapt, especially in the country’s northern and northeastern regions,” Islam told Al Jazeera.
Citing one of his research papers, he said even if average global temperatures increase modestly – by 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 Fahrenheit) over the average for pre-industrial times – flooding along the Brahmaputra river basin in northeastern India and Bangladesh is projected to increase by 24 percent. Aljazeera - link - Faisal Mahmud - link - more like this (climate change) - link - more like this (South Asia) - link
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