From time immemorial, cyclones and storm surges have been sweeping the large coastal population of 44 million people in Bangladesh. From historical records, 200,000 lives were lost in the 1876 cyclone, over 500,000 lives in 1970, and more than 138,000 lives in the cyclone of 1991.
Cyclone Sidr took 3,406 lives and destroyed resources worth $1,675 million. Cyclone Amphan made landfall in May 2020 and claimed 3,500 lives. According to multiple literature reviews, at least one devastating tropical cyclone sweeps through the coastal zone of Bangladesh every three years, affecting millions of people, destroying their homes and livelihoods, and consequently triggering migration in the coastal region.
Conversely, adapting to the disasters has also been a constant struggle of the people living in these coastal regions, who have had to undergo a complex process of development. Historical records of cyclones and storm surges show that while the lives lost due to these natural disasters have significantly decreased as a result of successful disaster management, economic losses remain high.
In the last 50 years of leadership in disaster management, Bangladesh has upgraded from being the most vulnerable country in South Asia to a resilient one. The major changes in policy and institutional domains, focusing on the decentralization of disaster management of local-level institutions since the 1990s, have contributed to this success.
The shift from relief and rehabilitation measures taken in the past towards a holistic warning based community preparedness and cohesive response efforts have also led to the decrease in the number of lives lost.
Numerous public institutions, along with national and international NGOs as well as volunteer-based organizations, have been implementing a framework that increases the resilience from the community level in the coastal zone where the people are always recovering from increasingly frequent natural disasters.
They have also identified the structural constraints such as poverty, governance, and a history of vulnerability, which has helped to create an effective model that has contributed to the success in disaster management today.
These projects with differing budgets and timeframe usually have a basic goal of creating a more resilient and sustainable community. For example, the International Centre for Climate Change and Development (ICCCAD) led a project spanning from 2013 to 2018 that promoted livelihood resilience and progress in the coastal belt of Bangladesh.
Another project which was primarily funded by the British Red Cross known as “Vulnerability to Resilience” also worked on the community level impacting the overall resilience capacity. Cyclone Preparedness Program (CPP) is another disaster management program by the government and Bangladesh Red Crescent Society under the Ministry of Disaster Management and Relief.
These projects and programs include consulting with the local government and people in the community, providing incentives such as financial support in exchange for development work (constructing/rebuilding roads and dams), financing to kickstart poultry, fishery, vegetable cultivation and entrepreneurship, providing cattle, sewing machines, and other goods, building sanitary latrines and tube-wells, and distributing safety equipments for people with hazardous livelihood. The people in the community also receive training in community mapping, search and rescue, and first aid.
The prevalence of early warning systems, along with construction of cyclone centres in disaster prone areas, has contributed to the current level of success in disaster management in Bangladesh. On top of that, the addition of increased efficiency in communication among people that has developed throughout the years such as widespread use of social media and mobile phones has transformed Bangladesh from a country that is severely vulnerable to natural disasters, to one that is resilient.
These programs have laid down the groundwork and provided notable changes and improvement in disaster management but many areas still remain which require immediate reforms. According to a study assessing the efficiency of disaster management institutions at the local level in the coastal region of Bangladesh, the early warning messages disseminated by the CPP are ignored by many people and they rarely take the decision to seek refuge in cyclone shelters during a disaster. There are many reasons for this lack of willingness to seek refuge in the cyclone centres, which include cyclone centres being inaccessible due to broken roads, lack of facilities for children, women, the elderly, and the disabled.
Pregnant and menstruating women face an added layer of difficulties since the cyclone centres often lack hygienic sanitation systems and clean water. There are reports of women’s health being compromised severely as they take birth control pills to delay their menstrual period and suffer from Urinary Tract Infections (UTIs) because of unsanitary water supply. The post-disaster phase in the cyclone centres are also very dangerous as the water goes down, the residual water brings a surge of water-borne diseases.
There are some initiatives being undertaken by NGOs that are working towards improving facilities in cyclone centres. For example, low cost menstrual pads being made available and the accessibility of the centres are being prioritized to increase the number of people responding to the warning promptly. Additionally, many issues are left to be addressed and tackled when it comes to Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR) such as bureaucratic complexities, corruption, and nepotism of the local government often hinder the Union Parishad (UP) and the NGOs to play their appropriate role at the post-disaster stage, access to gender responsive cyclone centres etc.
The improvement in Disaster Risk Reduction over the years can be attributed to the continuous effort made by the institutions and organizations, but it is imperative that we are not complacent to the urgent reformations and additional improvements required to be implemented for a holistic approach going forward in disaster management.
Roshni Islam is working as a reserach intern at ICCCAD. She can be reached [email protected]
