Community Resilience to Cyclone Disasters in Coastal Bangladesh

Abstract

Bangladesh is one of the poorest and most disaster-prone countries in the world. To address both problems simultaneously, sustainable livelihoods (SL) could be better connected with disaster risk reduction (DRR). For this purpose, one initiative implemented in Bangladesh is called the Vulnerability to Resilience (V2R) programme which ran from 2013 to 2016. This programme was primarily initiated and funded by the British Red Cross in a consortium with the Swedish Red Cross and the German Red Cross. This article presents the first evaluation of the V2R programme with three objectives. The first objective was to measure whether the selected communities have achieved community resilience characteristics as defined by the programme. The second objective was to conduct a cost-benefit analysis for the intervention. The third objective was to analyse V2R's impact on the communities in terms of DRR and SL. Community-based focus group discussions and household-based surveys were conducted before and after the intervention (2013)(2014)(2015)(2016) in two coastal communities in Patuakhali district, Nowapara and Pashurbunia. The analysis found that community members are now engaged with many hazard-resilient and vulnerability-reducing livelihood activities, using SL to implement DRR, yet these approaches were almost absent prior to V2R. Consequently, the communities have achieved resilience characteristics, being more well-organized and better connected; having better access to infrastructure, services, and economic opportunities; are more knowledgeable and healthier; and are better managing their available resources. Critiques of the concepts are discussed, although in this case, DRR based on SL has shown positive results, exactly as development theory suggests.

Living with the Risks of Cyclone Disasters in the South-Western Coastal Region of Bangladesh

“…The zone constitutes 32% unoccupied land and 28% population (i.e., projected about 44 million in 2016) of Bangladesh. This coastal zone forms the lowest landmass (in cases 0-30 cm MSL), part of a delta of the extended Himalayan drainage ecosystem, and is exceedingly prone to multiple threats like cyclones, storm surges, floods, tsunamis, and climate change [6,40].…”

“…The cyclone caused 3363 deaths, 1001 still missing, 55,282 injured people, 1.5 million damaged or destroyed homes, and 2.5 million acres of damaged farmland that affected about 8.9 million people. The total damage and losses caused by Cyclone Sidr was calculated to be US$ 1.7 billion [6,41].…”

“…The cyclone killed 236 people, injured more than 7000, damaged or destroyed more than 500,000 houses, damaged 6000 km of roads, caused more than 17,000 km of embankments to collapse, completely destroyed 275 primary schools, damaged 1942 schools, and affected a total of about 4.8 million people [6,42].…”

“…A catastrophic tropical cyclone is likely to hit the coastal region of Bangladesh almost every three years. The tropical cyclones cause casualties and damages and sometimes are responsible for cascading disasters [5,6]. It has been argued that cyclone hazards are natural, but disasters are man-made [7][8][9][10].…”

“…It is now possible to track the speed and direction of cyclones and warn the coastal communities well in advance, but still thousands of coastal families continue to be adversely affected by cyclones in Bangladesh. The absence of sufficient critical infrastructure and institutional support from the individual to the community level is a major issue, though Bangladesh has improved significantly in the field of disaster preparedness and prevention in recent years [6]. However, there is a dearth of proper implementation of policies, which requires an extensive investigation of how a coastal community in Bangladesh perceives, reacts, and adapts to a cyclone disaster.…”