5 RESPONDING TO CLIMATE CHANGE
AND NATURAL DISASTERS
94. Bangladesh is one of the most natural disaster-prone
countries in the world and this presents a major and ongoing impediment
to development. Over the past 20 years Bangladesh has been hit
by six major disasters—four floods and two cyclones—affecting
millions. In 1991 a cyclone killed 138,000 people and in 2007
a combined flood and cyclone affected 15 million people. About
53% of the total world deaths due to tropical cyclones have occurred
in Bangladesh. [143]
Bangladesh is however increasing its capacity to deal with floods
and cyclones and the death rate per natural disaster has decreased
over time.[144]
95. Climate change is likely to alter and in some
cases exacerbate existing hazards, and create new ones such as
rising sea levels.[145]
Scenarios for the future predict greater monsoon rainfall with
increased risk of flooding and decreased dry season rainfall leading
to drought and inland water salinity.[146]
A report by the Scientific Community on Antarctic Research said
that a predicted sea level rise of 1.4 metres would result in
the loss of large parts of Bangladesh and the Indian Ocean coast.[147]
The socio-economic impact of these changes is potentially significant:
responding to natural disasters consumes resources which could
otherwise be used to support poverty reduction and development.
DFID's support for climate change
adaptation and disaster risk reduction
96. DFID supports disaster risk reduction and climate
change adaptation initiatives in Bangladesh through the Comprehensive
Disaster Management Programme (CDMP). This is the main joint donor
vehicle in this sector.[148]
According to Christian Aid the CDMP emphasises local planning
by involving local government authorities and communities in developing
community risk assessment guidelines. However it notes that local
authorities often lack the resources, skills and capacity to implement
local action plans effectively. Christian Aid recommends that
any new CDMP should include a greater focus on increasing government
capacity at local and district level and ensure that it involves
relevant civil society organisations.[149]
97. DFID helped to prepare the Government of Bangladesh's
Disaster Management Act and Action Plan and its 10-year Climate
Change Strategy and Action Plan. It has also supported the development
of a Climate Change Cell within the government which seeks to
build capacity across government and civil society. DFID reports
that all its programmes have been assessed for climate vulnerability
and that it is rolling out a programme of "climate-proofing"
its programmes. [150]
INTEGRATING CLIMATE CHANGE INTO
DEVELOPMENT POLICY AND PRACTICE
98. Screening of donor programmes for climate risk
has become the main method by which climate change adaptation
is integrated into development cooperation. Climate risk screening
uses a framework which examines the exposure of development programmes
to current and future climate risks. It is based on the assumption
that adapting to the future climate is best done by improving
the country's ability to cope with existing climate variations.
99. In Bangladesh DFID uses the ORCHID (opportunities
and risks of climate change and disasters) methodology to assess
a number of its programmes for climate risk. Dr Tanner, from the
Institute of Development Studies, led the 2007 ORCHID assessment
of nine of DFID's programmes in Bangladesh. The assessment's general
recommendations included that DFID:
- continue to support climate
change from a risk management approach in terms of adapting to
existing climate vulnerabilities;
- support the Government of Bangladesh's programme
for adaptation;
- target those geographical areas most prone to
disaster such as the coastal zones;
- incorporate climate indicators within its programmes
to monitor climate impacts on poverty;
- continue to support adaptation as a process by
supporting dialogue on disaster management and by linking scientific
climate information with existing risk management practices;
- increase its emphasis on urban poverty reduction
given likely climate motivated rural-urban migration; and
- develop a multi-donor dialogue on mass-migration
and trans-boundary water issues.[151]
100. We were told that as a result of the assessment
DFID's new country programme has a much stronger emphasis on how
different aspects of development can help with climate change
adaptation, for example how improved governance can improve resilience
to climate shocks.[152]
Dr Tanner pointed out there was still some way to go, and in particular
that the regional aspect of climate change, flagged up in the
ORCHID assessment, had not received much attention from DFID.
This is discussed later in this chapter.
101. We were told that donors would increasingly
need to consider climate and environmental impacts in all their
programmes.[153] However,
while much of DFID's programme is screened to assess its climate
risk, government programmes in Bangladesh were not. Moreover,
this was still a remote prospect due to current lack of capacity
in the relevant ministries.[154]
Dr Tanner suggested that there was a need to make climate screening
programmes, such as ORCHID, more widely available: "work
to internationalise standards and norms on climate risk management
is urgently needed to be able to inform that process
of change where a country like Bangladesh can integrate those
in a more systematised way".[155]
102. Bangladesh is one of the countries most vulnerable
to climate change impacts. Climate variability and change risk
compromising the effectiveness of development assistance through
increased hazards to specific programmes. The frequency of natural
disasters is already thwarting progress on poverty reduction since
resources used to respond to natural disasters cannot also be
used to expand development programmes. The significance of this
challenge is likely to increase if predicted sea-level rises occur.
103. DFID has undertaken effective climate screening
of its programmes through the ORCHID assessment. This has resulted
in improved design of programmes. DFID Bangladesh must ensure
that all its programmes are "climate proofed" against
future risks. Climate risk management strategies also need to
be more widely available for developing country governments. We
understand there are factors which limit current government capacity
in Bangladesh. We nevertheless recommend that DFID work to create
international standards and norms on climate risk management and
ensure that countries as vulnerable as Bangladesh can and do utilise
these systematically.
Increasing the resilience of
the poor
104. Increasing the resilience of the poor is the
key to ensuring that they can respond to climate change impacts
and natural disasters. Dr Tanner explained that the poor are often
hardest hit by climate shocks and have the least ability to respond:
Bangladesh is vulnerable in part because of its
geography and natural hazards, but it is as strongly informed
by its human development, the human component of vulnerability.
It has very large numbers of poor people, who are poorly equipped
capacity wise and living in very marginal areas.[156]
We saw this vulnerability for ourselves on the fragile
island Chars where most families were too poor to move elsewhere.
105. In its Country Plan DFID says its programme
will help 15 million people to be better prepared to adapt to
and deal with the impacts of climate change. It will also improve
physical infrastructure such as cyclone shelters and flood defences.
Christian Aid expressed some concern that there might be too much
attention on the latter at the expense of the former and that
while cyclone shelters were important, they needed to be owned
by communities and adapted to their needs.[157]
It also commented that existing infrastructure needed to be maintained
before new construction took place and pointed out that a sea
wall in Chittagong district which had been breached in 2007 had
still not been repaired.[158]
106. In Bangladesh we visited two programmes which
sought to contribute to the resilience of poor households by increasing
their assets and providing them with the means to cope with short
term income loss, the BRAC Targeting the Ultra Poor (TUP)programme
and DFID's Chars Livelihoods Programme (CLP), both discussed in
the previous chapter.
107. DFID's evidence described the CLP as both a
livelihoods and a climate change programme.[159]
The Secretary of State has also emphasised that "the challenges
of poverty reduction and dealing with dangerous climate change
are now intertwined and indeed indivisible" He said that
the Chars programme was "an exemplar" of this and demonstrated
how difficult it was to define a project as "exclusively
poverty reduction" or "exclusively climate adaptation".[160]
108. Poverty on the Chars is related to their remoteness
and environmental instability. The islands are highly prone to
flooding during the monsoon season and susceptible to erosion.
It is estimated that the islands have a limited lifespan of 10
to 30 years before they are washed away and the sand is deposited
elsewhere. As discussed in chapter 3, this makes the government
reluctant to invest in the provision of services there. However
6.5 million people live in the Chars Livelihoods Programme area,
many of whom are extremely poor. Their ability to cope with floods
and to maintain their livelihoods is limited. The success of this
programme, and the BRAC ones, lies in their ability to tackle
poverty directly by increasing assets and raising homesteads on
plinths to reduce the flood risk. In this way resilience to cope
with climate change is increased, whether it be in the form of
predictable flooding or less predictable natural disasters. As
Dr Greeley pointed out, given the unpredictability of climate
change impacts the highest priority is to improve the resilience
of the poor.[161]
109. We welcome DFID-funded initiatives to improve
the resilience of the poorest, including the BRAC Targeting the
Ultra Poor and the Chars Livelihoods Programme. These demonstrate
the inter-related nature of tackling poverty and adapting to climate
change. The challenge presented by current and future climate
change impacts on Bangladesh is immense. We believe that the poorest
sectors of the population, who have the least ability to cope,
should be the primary beneficiaries of any new UK-funded programmes
helping Bangladesh to adapt to climate change.
Funding for climate change adaptation
110. While Bangladesh has robust disaster warning
systems in place and good disaster management capacity, it will
need financial assistance to cope with rising sea levels and increased
salinisation. Christian Aid believed that:
Developing countries such as Bangladesh urgently
require financial assistance to tackle the consequences of climate
change. It is very difficult to calculate the total sum needed
due to uncertainty about the scale of future impacts, a lack of
solid information at the country level and differing opinions
on what constitutes adaptation. However, initial estimates are
suggesting tens of billions of pounds per annum.[162]
111. There is as yet no climate change funding stream
in DFID's programme in Bangladesh. DFID's assistance is largely
incorporated into its spending on rural poverty reduction and
livelihoods programmes. Initiatives in this area have also been
taken forward in its Economic Empowerment of the Poorest Challenge
Fund for NGOs which includes the objective of reducing vulnerability
to climate change. However, DFID has pledged £75 million
over five years from its development budget to support Bangladesh's
climate change strategy. DFID explained to us how the funds would
be distributed:
Of the £75 million, £60 million has
been committed to a new multi-donor trust fund that will be administered
by the World Bank under government of Bangladesh direction […]
Of the other £15 million,
£12 million is for the second phase of the Comprehensive
Disaster Management Programme with the Ministry for Environment,
implemented by UNDP. We are continuing to channel our funds through
UNDP for that part of it. The final £3 million is to support
specific research activities which Bangladesh asks us to fund.[163]
112. Comments were made to us by NGOs in Bangladesh
about the management of the Multi Donor Trust Fund (MDTF) for
climate change by the World Bank. The MDTF was established after
cyclone Sidr to help Bangladesh to adapt to climate change. The
Fund is one of several available to the Government of Bangladesh
to help implement its climate change adaptation programmes. The
Government of Bangladesh has also established its own climate
change Trust Fund. Bretton Woods Project has raised concerns that
the Bank's management of the MDTF is costly, donor-driven and
inappropriate, given the World Bank's past record of investment
in ecologically unsound projects in Bangladesh. Bretton Woods
believes that one such project caused the destruction of the oldest
mangrove forest in the sub-continent.[164]
Dr Tanner believed that the claims about the high cost of the
World Bank management of the Fund were not well-founded. He said
that it was important to ensure that the Government of Bangladesh's
own recently established Trust Fund was performing well before
donors committed significant funds to it.[165]
113. We have expressed concerns about funding for
climate change being taken from funding already allocated to development
assistance. We made this point strongly in our recent report on
Sustainable Development in a Changing Climate where we
stated:
Adaptation represents an additional cost for
developing countries which have made negligible contributions
to greenhouse gas emissions. […] developed countries [...]
should [...] provide new, additional and predictable financial
flows to asset poor countries to tackle its impact. DFID must
take the lead on making clear its commitment to the principle
that climate change funding will be additional to existing pledges
on official development assistance.[166]
In making its announcements about funding for climate
change DFID has often been less than explicit about whether the
funds are new or additional. For example on 19 October 2009 DFID
announced that it was providing £75 million to support Bangladesh's
national climate change strategy but did not explain if this was
new or already announced funding.[167]
At our public meeting in London members of the audience said they
were not sure how much money DFID was providing for climate change
or whether this was new money. During the course of our inquiry,
the UK Government announced a contribution of £1.5 billion
funding for a new global climate change fund to help developing
countries adapt to climate change. It was not clear in that announcement
whether the funding was new. In fact the Minister himself was
unsure of this when we asked him about it but subsequently clarified
that it was from official development assistance (ODA) funds.[168]
114. DFID made a commitment in its 2009 White Paper
that a ceiling of 10% would be put on the amount of ODA which
could be used for climate change funding. It expected new, additional
funding for climate change to be available from 2013, arising
from the Copenhagen climate change conference in December 2009:
In terms of our ODA, what we have said is that
10% of our ODA can be used for climate change adaptation and mitigation.
In terms of new forms of finance that come out of Copenhagen and
how they will be allocated to developing countries, that is an
issue that is literally being discussed while we sit here.[169]
The £75 million which DFID is providing in Bangladesh
over a five-year period is approximately 10% of DFID's ODA to
Bangladesh. In respect of the Bangladesh country programme DFID
has thus kept within the 10% limit.
115. Funding for climate change adaptation and
mitigation in developing countries must be additional to existing
and pledged official development assistance. We recognise that
development projects can, and sometimes do, deliver outcomes which
increase resilience and constitute effective adaptation to climate
change. The implications of climate change for the outcomes of
all DFID's development programmes should therefore be carefully
assessed. However, this does not mean that development programmes
in health or education should be cut to pay for necessary climate
change adaptation. Equally, any new climate change programmes
in Bangladesh must have a development benefit.
116. DFID should make clear when announcing climate
change funding whether or not it represents new funding or will
draw on already pledged official development assistance (ODA).
We expect DFID to keep to its commitment to limit to 10% the amount
of ODA which can be used for climate change adaptation in Bangladesh
and throughout its bilateral programmes. We recommend that DFID
provide us with an update on the amount of new climate change
funding which will be available for Bangladesh after 2013 in the
light of the outcomes of the Copenhagen climate change conference.
Future scenarios: the regional
dimension
117. The ORCHID assessment recommends that DFID initiate
a multi-donor approach "to stimulate international dialogue
around crucial but complex and politically charged issues of mass-migration
and trans-boundary water issues."[170]
Dr Tanner told us that lessons from the ORCHID assessment about
the regional dimension of climate change had not been addressed
in country plans and that this was at odds with DFID's South Asia
division work plan: "regional country plans are very country
specific and I do not see that being matched by South Asia division's
plan for work that includes India, Bangladesh, Nepal".[171]
SOUTH ASIA WATER INITIATIVE
118. 90% of South Asia's water, including the "water
tower" of the Himalayas, flows through Bangladesh into the
Bay of Bengal. In 2007, 28 million people were affected by floods
in Nepal, India and Bangladesh.[172]
Changes to river management policies upstream therefore need to
take account of their potential impact on all countries through
which the rivers flow, including Bangladesh. In Nepal we were
told about DFID's work on the South Asia Water Initiative (SAWI).
The Initiative, which was launched in 2008, includes the seven
countries that share the waters that drain from the Greater Himalayas—Afghanistan,
Bangladesh, Bhutan, China, India, Nepal and Pakistan—and
is facilitated by the World Bank. Its primary aim is to encourage
cooperative management of shared waters, which it is hoped will
promote poverty reduction, low carbon growth and regional stability.
DFID has provided £2.6 million over 3 years to support SAWI
through a multi-donor trust fund managed by the World Bank.[173]
119. DFID Bangladesh's work on water and sanitation
is largely about improved domestic supplies and good hygiene practices
and only a "low proportion of the DFID Bangladesh portfolio
is directly engaged in climate-sensitive water and agricultural
sectors".[174]
DFID said it was committed to looking at regional water management
but did not provide any evidence of this.[175]
Since a large part of Bangladesh is below or at sea-level and
many of its natural disasters are related to sea-level rises and
rivers flooding, we would expect the management of water resources,
including those in neighbouring countries, to be an integral part
of DFID's disaster risk reduction work in Bangladesh. We recommend
that DFID provide us with a detailed report on how the South Asia
Water Initiative is progressing and how this is impacting on DFID's
programme in Bangladesh in its response to this Report.
REGIONAL CLIMATE CHANGE-TRIGGERED
MIGRATION
120. Migration is inevitable if habited land becomes
submerged. The estimates for Bangladesh are that 30 million people
would be made homeless if sea levels rose by more than one metre.[176]
DFID has reported that by 2050, 70 million people in Bangladesh
could be affected by annual floods and 8 million by drought with
increasingly intense cyclones hitting the coast.[177]
The European Action Group on climate change in Bangladesh believed
that: "rises in sea levels are already having a dramatic
impact on Bangladesh. The government needs to begin now with creating
jobs and opportunities for people who live in dangerous coastal
areas and have no other options".[178]
Bangladesh's Finance Minister is reported to have asked developed
countries to accept climate change migrants. He said, "We
are asking our development partners to honour the natural right
of persons to migrate. We can't accommodate all these people".[179]
121. When we asked DFID what it was doing to prepare
for increased numbers of people being forced to move as a result
of flooding we were told that its strategy was not directly to
try to stop people from moving but to give them the skills and
opportunities to improve their livelihoods in Bangladesh or abroad
including providing English language training.[180]
122. Millions of people are regularly affected
by floods in Bangladesh. If predicted sea-level rises occur 30
million people will be made homeless and this will, of necessity,
trigger migration. We accept that this is still a future scenario
and that predictions are sometime inaccurate. Nevertheless we
believe that DFID should re-examine its approach to potential
climate change-triggered migration and begin to assess how it
can help the Government of Bangladesh to manage such events. DFID
has responded to most of the recommendations in the ORCHID assessment
but does not appear to have responded to the recommendation that
it develop a multi-donor approach to stimulate dialogue on mass
migration and trans-boundary water management. We endorse the
ORCHID conclusion and recommend that DFID Bangladesh initiate
this discussion in the next 12 months and report its progress
to us.
143 Tanner et al, ORCHID: Piloting Climate Risk Screening
in Bangladesh, Summary Report, p 16 Back
144
Qs 72, 126 Back
145
Tanner et al, ORCHID: Piloting Climate Risk Screening in DFID
Bangladesh, Summary Report p 4 Back
146
Tanner et al, ORCHID: Piloting Climate Risk Screening in Bangladesh,
Summary Report p 3 Back
147
"Nations will vanish and millions lose their homes to rising
seas", The Times, 1 December 2009 Back
148
Ev 64 Back
149
Ev 64 Back
150
Ev 71 Back
151
Tanner et al, ORCHID, p 6 Back
152
Qs 131-133 Back
153
Q 129 Back
154
Q 134 Back
155
Q 134 Back
156
Q 125 Back
157
Q 72 Back
158
Q 75 Back
159
Ev 79 Back
160
Evidence taken in the inquiry into DFID's Annual Report and White
Paper 2009 on 25 November 2010, Q 128 Back
161
Q 109 Back
162
Ev 62 Back
163
Q 94 Back
164
Bretton Woods Project, Unjustifiable Bank domination over climate
funds in Bangladesh, 20 November 2009 Back
165
Qs 137-138 Back
166
International Development Committee, Fifth Report of Session 2008-09,
Sustainable Development in a Changing Climate, HC 177-I,
para 61 Back
167
DFID Bangladesh, Poverty and Climate change, 19 October
2009 Back
168
Q 200, Ev 108 Back
169
Q 197 Back
170
Tanner et al, ORCHID, p 6 Back
171
Q 133 Back
172
"Thousands affected by Nepal flood" 20 August 2008,
www.bbc.co.uk Back
173
DFID, Meeting our promises: fifth update on DFID's work in water
and sanitation since the 2004 Water Action Plan, 2009 Back
174
Tanner et al, ORCHID, p 5 Back
175
Q 107 Back
176
"On the climate change front-line", The Daily Telegraph,
2 December 2009 Back
177
DFID, Bangladesh - poverty and climate change, Press release,
19 October 2009 Back
178
Ev 85 Back
179
"When the sea forces millions from their land", The
Guardian, 5 December 2009 Back
180
Q 209 Back
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