Bangladesh faces climate change with doubts about its survival

New Delhi, April 29, 2007. - More than 15 million people at risk of becoming "climate refugees" in Bangladesh where, according to the UN Environment Program, a rise of 1.5 meters in sea level would away 16 percent of its territory.
"We have no development or infrastructure. Just emit harmful gases into the atmosphere. So, while rich countries pollute and the earth warms, we are the victims, "said Efe from Dhaka a spokesman for the Center for Advanced Study in Bangladesh (BCAS), Jandakar Mainudin.
At home, set around extensive Sundarbans delta, formed by the rivers Ganges, Brahmaputra and Meghna, about 60 of its 140 million people-overwhelmingly poor, live less than 10 meters above sea level, making them particularly vulnerable to any change of the medium.
"There are many people affected. Our land is very flat and coastal people will have to flee northward. Still, we have the advantage that it is a process that happens slowly, "he told Efe AQM Mahbub professor of ecology at the University of Dhaka.
According to a report released this month, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change UN forecasts for the year 2100 an increase in sea levels that threaten coastal areas and plains of the country, dominated by the Sundarbans delta ("beautiful jungle" in Bengali).
Of the major rivers, Bangladesh gets the fertile source of its agriculture, dependent on monsoon rains, while the action of the ocean has allowed the extraction of salt and the development of fisheries.
And now, with the increase in global mean temperature and the melting of Himalayan glaciers and the polar areas, the coastline of the country, where the biggest beach in the world (Cox's Bazar, about 120 kilometers long), suffers and the pressure of the water.
"It's like time has gone mad: Too many or too few showers. The sea enters the delta and the rivers carry less and less water. Some offshore islands have already disappeared, "he said by telephone Mainudin.
Quantified in three millimeters per year by the World Bank, rising sea level is related to global warming, but also with decreasing flow of major rivers, drowned by the construction of dams and erosion.
The Ganges, Brahmaputra and Meghna drag tons of sediment that modify the ground and act as a powerful agent against environmental degradation of the riverbanks, where they have built shacks million people in defiance of the obvious risk involved reside at the level of water.
Each year, about 95 million farmers in Bangladesh expect with a mixture of fear and anxiety to drought and floods that come with the monsoon, so important for their livelihood and fertility of crops as dangerous to their lives.
"Our culture blessing because monsoon rains are very important for crops. But due to climate change, severe floods are becoming more frequent. Just check the dates of the last "maintains Mahbub.
Between the catastrophic flood of 1954 and the following similar effect spent 20 years as the teacher. Then, the interval was reduced to 14 years (1988), then to 10 (1998) and then to 6, in 2004, when was the last great flood, which caused 600 deaths and 4 million displaced.
The realization of climate change must take, according to the BCAS, to rich countries reduce their emissions of greenhouse gases, but also the development of pilot projects help, because Mainudin says, "apart from the great words to do something here and now. "
And as climate change looms as a threat to the future of the Bengalis, millions of poor peasants waiting in the Sundarbans delta arrival, like clockwork, the next monsoon.

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