Equating micro-credit with coastal cataclysms

Micro-credit programmes, both nationally and internationally, have been given the due cognisance in raising the livelihood standard of the country's rural poor. It has been very rightly and profoundly pointed out that resources investment under micro-credit programmes is always at high risk of natural disasters which can sweep the vulnerable poor away with eventual disappearance in a jiffy making the entire programme unsustainable; the best example being the living memory of the recent tsunami. Micro-credit is thus seen to have a phenomenal linkage with the coastal cataclysms. Blessed with natural resources Bangladesh, on the contrary, is plagued by natural perils that among others include cyclones, cyclone generated storm surges, erosions, categorically in the coastal region. Pasting the issue of safety and security to the coastal community on the side-top of the micro-credit agenda, therefore, seems rational.

The coastal lands of Bangladesh comprise of approximately 42,000 sq.km. The population is 33 million with density about same as compared to the rest of the country. The poverty rate is 53 percent as against 48 percent for the whole of the nation. The advancement made by micro credit financing so far needs to be sustained and economic growth driven further forward by defending the beneficiaries against the recurrent natural disasters.

Over the past century, much before the current version of the micro-credit concept was on the ground, the coastal defence systems had been built up initially to protect agriculture and subsequently to enhance the safety and security to life and property of the coastal community. In doing so the foreshore infrastructure along the 710 km. long coast of the nation has pushed the bay past its natural limit raising confrontation between the forces of nature and human interventions which is ubiquitous across the world. As a consequence, globally 100 million people live within one meter of the mean sea level. Such density is higher along Bangladesh coast. The synergy is the increased vulnerability of the coastal rural poor to unavoidable natural calamities. It has to be borne in mind that coastal cataclysms like a chopping axe over the head continuously multiply and recycle the rural poverty. The coastal defence in such an un-breathing situation is the only sentry that can guarantee the micro-credit programmes.

Coastal defence is the protection of the coastline from erosion by the sea and the protection of the coastal lands from extreme hydraulic events. It is intended for protecting foreshore and backshore infrastructure, industries, businesses, homes, and agricultural and recreational lands against erosion and flooding. The objective is to reduce the risks to people and the natural environment by encouraging the provision of technically, environmentally and economically sound and sustainable defence measures.The management of coastal defences within a strategic framework is the preferred option to achieve this objective which needs a holistic approach to ensure that programmes are fully integrated within the wider environment and address the sustainability issues adequately. The programme is to provide the basis for sustainable coastal defence policies over at least the next fifty years and to set the framework for the future management of risks along the coastline. In recent years there has been a significant change in perception that professionals have been addressing coastal defence issues. The change has arisen from an increasing awareness of a need for those involved with coastal issues to work in more integrated and harmonised manner.

The natural evolution of the coast together with the recurring cataclysms including climate change and sea level rise brings in challenges to future coastal defence management as there will be increased levels of risk to coastal population and property. The coastal defence strategy may deliver a preferred approach to coastal defence identifying the best engineering scheme taking account of economic and environmental issues, including any environmental mitigation measures required for designated habitats. For the purpose, the nation's coastline may be divided into major 'sediment cells'. A sediment cell is defined as a length of coastline which is relatively self-contained as far as the transportation and movement of sediments is concerned and where interventions into such movements do not have a significant effect on adjacent sediment cells. The boundaries of such sediment cells in nation's coast coincide with the mouths of estuaries or prominent coastal headlands.

An important factor in the development of sustainable coastal defence is, therefore, co-operation between adjacent coastal communities in order to ensure that the activities of one community do not have a detrimental effect on its neighbours. In addition, it is important to be able to share knowledge and experiences and to commission research and disseminate findings as widely as possible. This co-ordination is achievable reasonably effectively through the interactive participation of the Community Based Organizations in the coast.

The government of Bangladesh has initiated a process for integration and harmonisation of sustainable utilisation of coastal resources by different agencies. The process has more focused on integrated coastal zone management rather than the need for building up dependable coastal defence systems. The follow-up of the process therefore would require inclusion of the issues and aspects of frontline defence of the coast. Some of the key issues that require increased attention for drawing up coastal defence systems may be the following:

a. Coastal flooding would increase substantially by 2050.

b. The increase in flood risk varies across the 710 km coastline with however south-eastern part consistently at higher.

c. Coastal towns and cities will also be subjected to localised flooding due to impaired drainage of local rainfalls.

d. Coastal erosion will increase substantially in all scenarios. Average annual damage is guesstimated to be increased ten-fold by 2050

e. Increased flooding could bring both opportunities and threats for the environment. Salt farming and shrimp culture could benefit from abandonment of uneconomic coastal farmland under some scenarios, but habitats such as coastal grazing fields will be threatened including a qualitative damage to coastal ecology under every scenario.

f. Non-structural measures such as installing or networking the early warning system and setting the appropriate institution for the development and management of the coastal defence systems will be of equal importance.

The coastal interventions may have several options such as (i) holding the existing defence where it is now, (ii) moving the existing defence further seaward, (iii) retreating the existing defence more landward, and (iv) carrying out no coastal defence activity except for safety measures. In any case however it will rest with the policy makers as to acceptance of increasing levels of flooding, maintaining existing risk-levels or reducing the risks of disastrous flooding. Interventions should be sustainable taking account of the interrelationships with other defences, developments and processes within the coastal zone which should avoid, as far as possible, tying future generations into inflexible and expensive options for coastal defence systems.

Coastal defence systems as evident are the lone confidante of micro-credit programmes that support brightening the faces of the coastal rural poor with hopes and aspirations. The long-term visionary statement of the micro-credit programmes, as such, should include the longer dependability of the coastal defence systems for protecting the credit target groups from natural disasters. Micro-credit programmes must, therefore, move forward hand-in-hand with the future coastal defence systems to truly strip-off the curse of poverty.

Md. Saeedur Rahman is a retired Chief Engineer of BWDB