2 minute read
Day 6: CCDB – Community Practices for Resilience Building
CCDB – COMMUNITY PRACTICES FOR RESILIENCE BUILDING
Presenters: Mohammad Mahmodul Hasan, Farida Khatun
To understand Bangladesh’s vulnerability to climate change, participants watched a video on the effects of cyclones, sea level rise, and salinity intrusion into coastal communities. CCDB is implementing a project in coastal areas that will help to reduce these effects and enhance the resilience of communities. The program has four components: community resilience building; greenhouse gases emission reduction; research, advocacy and capacity building; and its Climate Centre. CCDB is developing an online climate knowledge portal for people to access information.
With an emphasis on local resources and knowledge, specific climate change issues have been identified at both the community and household levels, and adaptations have been developed. Agricultural adaptations include vertical, tower, hanging and floating gardening, introduction of saline tolerant and less irrigated varieties of seed, and improved crop patterns. Rainwater harvesting, pond filtering systems and solar desalinization plants benefit local communities, especially women, with the reduction of time spent collecting fresh water. Cyclone shelters serve as resilience centres and community meeting spaces for interactive learning and training, and support livelihood activities of coastal residents. Home solar systems offer offgrid electricity and improved cooking stoves reduce the need for firewood and lessen greenhouse gases. CCDB described tools used for building a community resilience framework, including household based risk assessment, resilience building strategy, and a sustainability scorecard assessment.
Participants discussed examples of climate events in their own countries and impacts on livelihoods. Climate events ranged from drought, low crop yields, wildfires, heat waves, and cyclones. The groups shared successful adaptation actions practiced for community resilience, including tree planting to reverse deforestation, harvesting rainwater, carbon reduction, and social enterprises. Youth should be encouraged to learn about climate change and adaptation at an early age. They can assist older generations to understand new concepts and help mitigate climate change for the future.
DEEPENING GENDER LEARNING
Women’s roles are important in climate change responses. They are often central to local food systems yet are often an untapped resource. Women must be included in decision making and leadership. Youth also have a key role to play, but we need to be mindful to define what we mean by youth, and specify young women in particular. One participant noted an agroforestry project in Kenya that used ABCD tools and was able to uncover the hidden talents of the women involved.
NEW QUESTIONS TO EXPLORE
Translating complex climate change issues and policy responses is challenging. Can we apply the model of the women’s peace conference to understand the outcomes of events like COP26? COP26, we may understand what that is, but many don’t. When you root it in ABCD at a local level, you see daily ramifications of degradation. - Lucia
