GBM-Bangladesh

New DECCMA brief “Climate change and the economic future of deltas in Africa and Asia”

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The DECCMA Economics team have released a new policy brief “Climate change and the economic future of deltas in Africa and Asia“.  The policy brief is led by the team from the Basque Centre for Climate Change, and summarises some of the key findings on the current and future economic status of deltas, taking into account climate change, and distills information from papers published in the peer-reviewed literature (including “The socioeconomic future of deltas in a changing environment” by Arto et al).

The brief highlights how climate change has the potential to reduce GDP per capita by 8.5-14.5% in the deltas, through impacts on infrastructure, agriculture and fisheries. Traditional adaptation options, such as embankments and protection and restoration of mangroves, could only reduce these effects by up to 40-50%, thus minimising but not ruling out negative impacts.

New release “Climate change, migration and adaptation in deltas. Key findings from the DECCMA project”

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DECCMA has just released a new publication, “Climate change, migration and adaptation in deltas. Key findings from the DECCMA project” available to download in optimal resolution (15MB) and lower resolution (6MB). The publication summarises our key findings on the present and future situation of deltas, highlights some of the impacts our research has had on policies and plans in Bangladesh, India and Ghana, and reflects on the capacity that has been built through the DECCMA project.

Deltas: present and future-new infographic from DECCMA

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DECCMA has released a new infographic that summarises what we know about deltas in the present and future. Deltas are already exposed to sea level rise, coastal erosion, flooding and salinisation. In the future climate risk will increase beyond 2050, but the particular nature of hazards differs between deltas. In the Volta in Ghana, for example, erosion and flooding is driven by waves and sea level rise; whereas the future of the Ganges-Brahmaputra-Meghna is more dependent on sediment input than other deltas.

Deltas are already important contributors to national economies. In the future agriculture will become less significant in economies due to land degradation and erosion, but models show a slight increase in the productivity of brackish fisheries.

People in deltas are already mobile but in future mobility will be exacerbated by the effects of climate and environmental stresses on livelihood options.

Adaptation is already taking place, but more will be required in future. Infrastructural adaptations, such as dykes and embankments, are required, as is effective planning, such as the Bangladesh Delta Plan 2100. Policy frameworks should be revisited to enable gender-equitable adaptation and support for internally displaced persons. Migration also provides opportunities for adaptation.

New book published “Ecosystem services for well-being in deltas. Integrated assessment for policy analysis”

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A new book “Ecosystem services for well-being in deltas. Integrated assessment for policy analysis” has just been published open access by Springer. The book is an output of a predecessor project to DECCMA, ESPA Deltas. Chapters include analysis of ecosystem trends and projected futures under climate change, governance analysis, poverty and social-ecological systems analysis, and the linkages between poverty and ecosystem services in the Ganges-Brahmaputra-Meghna delta in Bangladesh.

Contributors include DECCMA PI Robert Nicholls, Co-PIs Craig Hutton, Stephen Darby, Andrew Allan, Neil Adger, Susan Kay, Sugata Hazra, Tuhin Ghosh, Munsur Rahman and Masfiqus Salehin, as well as DECCMA researchers Helen Adams, Anisul Haque, Paul Whitehead, Sally Brown, Shahjahan Mondal, Fiifi Amoako Johnson and Attila N. Låzår.

DECCMA Bangladesh provides contributions to the design of a new adaptation project funded by GEF and UNDP

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by Saiful Alam

DECCMA Bangladesh team members were invited to participate in a consultation to formulate a project addressing climate change risks in selected Agro-Ecological Zones (AEZs) in Bangladesh. The project is likely to be funded to the tune of $8 million by the Global Environment Facility (GEF) and United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and will benefit five pilot areas in Bangladesh: Chittagong, Chittagong Hill Tracts, dryland, floodplain and haor (wetland ecosystem).

The stakeholder consultation was organized by the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change (MoEFCC) on 5 July 2018 at Pan Pacific Sonargoan Hotel, Dhaka. Dr. S. M. Munjurul Hannan Khan, Additional Secretary, MoEFCC presided over the consultation meeting. Mr Abdullah Al Mohsin Chowdhury, Secretary-in Charge, MoEFCC and Dr. Sultan Ahmed, Director-General, Department of Environment (DoE) contributed as Chief Guest and moderator respectively.

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DECCMA, Bangladesh members Dr. Md. Munsur Rahman, Dr. Mohammed Abed Hossain and Saiful Alam attended the meeting, and provided comments on the approach and methods proposed. They also shared feedback on possible adaptation measures, informed by DECCMA’s adaptation research in the Ganges-Brahmaputra-Meghna delta.

Summing up the findings from the consultation, Mr Abdullah Al Mohsin Chowdhury, Secretary-in Charge, MoEFCC, proposed taking into account DECCMA’s adaptation inventories so as to not unnecessarily re-invent the wheel. Dr. Sultan Ahmed, DG, DoE, further suggested referring to DECCMA’s findings on hotspots of climate change risk in Bangladesh.

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DECCMA Bangladesh PI leads seminar on how sediment load affects the nature of the Ganges-Brahmaputra-Meghna delta

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by Institute of Water and Flood Management

DECCMA PI Professor Munsur Rahman led a seminar on ‘Recent sediment flux and its implications for river and delta management in the Ganges-Brahmaputra-Meghna system’ on 3rd April at the Institute of Water and Flood Management (IWFM) at the Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology.

Sediment flux is the mechanism that creates the nature of a delta, and thus is essential for river and delta management. The physical sustainability of the river and delta environment is very  sensitive to the volume of water and sediment that arrives from rivers upstream. In most of the planning documents in Bangladesh, the total sediment flux is assumed to be a constant value of around 1 billion tones per year. Recent models shows that, under climate change, there is likely to be an increase in sediment flux. However, this contradicts historical time series data, that shows a decreasing trend of sedimentation.

Courtesy of the Institute of Water and Flood Management

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Studies on the total sediment load in the Ganges and the Brahmaputra show that the quantity transferred along the bed of the river is decreasing more rapidly than the sediment that is suspended within the water. A reduction in sediment within the system reduces the scope for  offsetting future sea level rise, and thus has implications for subsidence and loss of land.

Recognising the importance of sediment quantity and flows in thus essential to manage the delta. The seminar concluded by emphasising the need for discussion and negotiation on sediment flux and water sharing to reduce the effect of dams upstream within Bangladesh and neighbouring countries. Along with the faculty members of IWFM guests from relevant organisations were also present, including Bangladesh Water Development Board, the Directorate of Bangladesh Haor and Wetland Division, Local Government Engineering Department, Centre for Environmental and Geographic Information Systems and the Bangladesh Export Processing Zones Authority.

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DECCMA and HI-AWARE jointly convene stakeholder workshop with WARPO to disseminate Bangladesh research findings

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by Saiful Alam

A joint stakeholder workshop was arranged by DECCMA and HI-AWARE to present Bangladesh research findings. The meeting took place at the Water Resources Planning Organisation (WARPO) in Dhaka on 17th January 2018. Attendees included the Ministry of Water Resources, Ministry of Forest and the Environment, Ministry of Finance, Ministry of Planning, Housing Authority, Local Government Division, and UNDP.

DECCMA Bangladesh Principal Investigator, Professor Munsur Rahman, and Co-Principal Investigator, Professor Mashfiqus Salehin, made a joint keynote presentation on ‘Adaptation and Migration in GBM Delta, Bangladesh’. HI-AWARE Bangladesh Principal Investigator, Md. Abu Syed, made a keynote presentation on ‘Climate resilience and adaptation in Teesta sub-Basin of Brahmaputra Basin’.

Stakeholders provided inputs to highlight their particular areas of interest in DECCMA findings. Among the key themes were an understanding of the reasons for migration, quantifying negative and positive impacts, and projections for the future-to add to those already outlined in the Delta Plan 2100. There was also interest in modelling the impact of climate change on the economy, as is being undertaken within DECCMA, led by the Bc3 Basque Centre for Climate Change, and supporting the use of models at local (upazila) level.

“An environment for wellbeing: Pathways out of poverty”-learning from the Ecosystem Services for Poverty Alleviation programme

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Ecosystem Services for Poverty Alleviation (ESPA) is a global interdisciplinary research programme that began in 2009 with the aim of giving decision-makers and natural resource users the evidence they need to address the challenges of sustainable ecosystem management and poverty reduction. The programme was developed by the UK government in response to the findings of the 2005 Millennium Ecosystem Assessment that substantial gains in human well-being in recent decades have been achieved at the expense of high and often irreversible levels of ecosystem degradation.

This short film highlights some of ESPA’s findings on the role of ecosystem services in diversifying livelihood options for vulnerable people, the contribution of sustainably managed ecosystem services to national wealth (and related poverty reduction), and insights into how to better manage ecosystems to deliver sustainable, green and inclusive growth. It features insights from ESPA Deltas and ECOLIMITS, looking at the ecological limits of poverty alleviation focusing on smallholder coffee farmers in Ethiopia, and cocoa farmers in Ghana.

DECCMA co-organises session on climate change, migration and adaptation at the South Asian Network on Economic Modelling annual conference in Bangladesh

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by Saiful Alam

DECCMA co-organised a session with the South Asian Network on Economic Modelling on “Climate change, migration and adaptation: Challenges and way forward for Bangladesh” at the 3rd SANEM Annual Economists’ Conference 2018. The conference was titled “Leave no one behind in South Asia” and took place on February 17-18, 2018 in Mohakhali, Bangladesh.

Mashfiqus Salehin introduces the DECCMA project

Dr. Mashfiqus Salehin, IWFM, gave an overview of the aims and objectives of the DECCMA project and the ways in which it has investigated the nature of climate hazards, vulnerability, adaptation and migration in coastal Bangladesh. He explained the empirical evidence received from extensive stakeholder engagement, the analysis of vulnerability in the hotspots and concluded with the importance of household adaptations in the reduction of climate related vulnerability in the coastal region.

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Dr. Bazlul Haque Khondker and Zubayer Hossen from SANEM presented DECCMA’s economic framework. This involved the use of stakeholder consultation to provide insights into the Input-Output table of Computable General Equilibrium model in explaining its linkages with livelihood, income and other economic parameters in the agriculture-dominated coastal environment.

Panelists Dr. Anwara Begum, BIDS and Mr. Saiful Alam, DECCMA, discussed the gender dimensions of adaptation and how the research findings on livelihoods and adaptation can influence climate-related policy and planning in Bangladesh. In an open discussion, the panelists answered a number of question from the audience related to the relevance to climate policy and the Sustainable Development Goals.

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ESPA Deltas project publishes short film on creating a sustainable future for climate-vulnerable deltas

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The Ecosystem Services for Poverty Alleviation Delta Project has just published a short film that highlights its findings in Bangladesh. The project was concerned with assessing health, livelihoods, ecosystems and poverty alleviation in populous deltas to provide knowledge and tools to enable policy-makers to evaluate the effects of policy decisions on people’s livelihoods.

A multidisciplinary and multi-national team of policy analysts, social and natural scientists and engineers collectively used a participatory approach to create a model to formally evaluate ecosystem services and poverty in the context of the wide range of changes that are occurring. In the film, DECCMA Principle Investigator Professor Robert Nicholls and researcher Dr Helen Adams talk about the environmental and social stresses facing delta populations, from salinity and subsidence to poverty and marginalisation.