Governance Challenges in Addressing Climatic Concerns in Coastal Asia and Africa

Abstract

Coastal people, especially those living within deltaic areas, encounter major climatic concerns which affect their livelihoods. To cope with this problem, different types of planned adaptation strategies have been implemented guided by laws, policies and programs. However, these guiding documents sometimes fall short of addressing the needs of climate-affected people, especially in natural resource-dependent societies in Asia and Africa. Based on this premise, this paper sought to evaluate the effectiveness of existing policy documents which affect the lives of people living in one large delta (Ganges-Brahmaputra-Meghna in Bangladesh), two medium-sized deltas (Indian Bengal delta—part of the Ganges-Brahmaputra-Meghna and Mahanadi in India), and a small-sized delta (Volta in Ghana). The study followed a mixed methods research design, which included desktop analyses of policies, laws and programs, a questionnaire survey conducted among individuals who played various roles in the policy and legal development processes at national and local levels and focus group discussions at the community level in the three countries. National laws, policies and programs were assessed in the context of climate change adaptation through three lenses: human rights, natural resource management and disaster response. Findings of this paper reveal that the existing documents have some strengths to promote adaptation, although they have some major limitations that cause concerns among the delta communities.

Climate change impacts and adaptations on health of Internally Displaced People (IDP): An exploratory study on coastal areas of Bangladesh

“…Also, BCCSAP-2009 consists of 44 programs under six pillars and focuses on developing resilience of vulnerable communities by implementing the Community Based Adaptation (CBA) ( MoEF, 2009 ). Along with the adoption of new crop varieties, tree plantation, development of financial status, and homestead gardening as an adaptation to climate change, migration is also considered to have a significant potentiality in Bangladesh ( Hossen et al., 2019 ; Chowdhury et al., 2018 ; Alam et al., 2019 ). Improving the adaptive capacity is essential, and to some extent, migration is also considered as a way of adaptation to ensure a healthy life ( Black et al., 2011 ; Brouwer et al., 2007 ; Pachauri and Meyer, 2014 ).…”

“…Climate change is happening globally, with significant effects on life and resources (Cubasch et al, 2013;IPCC, 2010). Because the of geographical location and socioeconomic conditions of Bangladesh, the climate change-related push factors, e.g., sea-level rise, cyclones, flash floods, riverbank erosion, salinity intrusion, are increasing, for which ultimately the number of the displaced people is rising at an alarming rate (Hasnat et al, 2020;Hossen et al, 2019). It is projected that a mean sea level of 3 m will inundate 69% of the exposed areas (Alam et al, 2018).…”

Gendered Perspectives on Climate Change Adaptation: A Quest for Social Sustainability in Badlagaree Village, Bangladesh

“…Such studies predict that climate change will increase the vulnerabilities of different human populations, particularly through impacting the resilience of water resources [3]. Here, Bangladesh is recognized globally as one of the countries most vulnerable to climate change due to its geographical position, low-lying situation and high population densities [4]. Vulnerabilities in this context are related to multiple climate change effects, including flooding, cyclones, sea-level rise and drought [5,6].…”

Estimating Benefits of Nature-based Solutions: Diverging Values From Choice Experiments With Time or Money Payments

“…However, current investment in NBS is limited (WWPAP/ UN-Water, 2018;Deutz et al, 2020), even though both the physical and cost-effectiveness of NBS have been proven (Ferrario et al, 2014;Narayan et al, 2016;Reguero et al, 2018). Because developing countries are generally more vulnerable to the impacts of climate change and natural hazards (IPCC, 2014;Jongman et al, 2015;Hossen et al, 2019), developing countries may benefit more from NBS. Still, compared to developed countries, progress on transitioning to a sustainable and climate resilient future in developing countries is lagging behind (Hinkel et al, 2012;IPCC, 2014).…”