CULTURE, ADAPTATION AND RESILIENCE: Essays on Climate Change Regime in South Asia (original) (raw)
Related papers
Sustainability, 2024
This study explores the imperative need for decolonizing climate change adaptation strategies by focusing on Indigenous knowledge and perspectives. Focusing on the Munda Indigenous communities residing in the coastal areas of Bangladesh, the research offers critical insights into the intricate relationship between Indigenous wisdom and sustainable climate adaptation. By engaging with the Munda Indigenous people and their traditions, this study explores how traditional ecological knowledge and practices can inform and enhance contemporary climate adaptation efforts. Following the decolonial theoretical research framework, this research used participatory research methods and collaboration with the Munda Indigenous community. In this study, we shared our learning reflections to uncover unique approaches to climate resilience, including traditional community-based disaster risk reduction and cultural practices that foster social cohesion. These insights challenge the prevailing Western-centric climate adaptation paradigms, emphasizing recognizing and valuing Indigenous voices in climate discourse. The research underscores the significance of empowering Indigenous communities as key stakeholders in climate adaptation policy and decision-making. It calls for shifting from top-down, colonial approaches towards more inclusive, culturally sensitive strategies. The Munda Indigenous communities’ experiences offer valuable lessons that can inform broader efforts to address climate change, fostering resilience and harmonious coexistence between people and their environment. This study advocates for integrating Indigenous knowledge, practices, and worldviews into climate adaptation frameworks to create more effective, equitable, and sustainable solutions for the challenges posed by climate change.
Abstract Human communities inhabiting remote and geomorphically fragile flood plain areas are particularly vulnerable to climate change-related hazards and hydrometeorological extremes. This study presents the community livelihood structure, perception of climate change, and indigenous coping strategies adopted by the local communities in the flood plain areas especially at the Hail haor. Field observations reveal that there have been several recent phenomena that are identified and reported on the manifestations of climate change by the respondent community members. These phenomena includes the following: loss of income (90 %), reduced fish availability (80 %), reduced fish diversity (70 %), reduced migratory bird’s availability (70 %), decreased crop production (70 %), food crisis (70 %), reduced aquatic plants availability (60 %), sudden flood (60 %), increased storm (60 %), decreased water-retaining capacity of beels and haor (60 %), increased drought (50 %), temperature rise (50 %), drying of water supply canal (50 %), scattered rainfall patterns (40 %), increased fish diseases during winter season (40 %), increased human viral diseases (20 %), and introduction of unknown paddy diseases (red coloration of plant, 20 %). The indigenous adaptation and coping strategies were identified. The correlations between coping strategies and physical, human, financial, natural, and social assets were significant. From the present field observation, it is evident that livestock rearing, homestead vegetable gardening, increased fishing time, and change in livelihood options found as most effective options to cope with the adverse effect of climate change. By identifying localized climate change disasters with intensity of impacts and analyzing indigenous coping mechanisms, this study attempts to address the community-based adaptation practices in climate change challenges.
INDIGENOUS AND LOCAL KNOWLEDGE AND PRACTICES FOR CLIMATE RESILIENCE IN NEPAL
Knowledge summary The findings of this study reinforce widely held views that ILKP help local communities deal with climate-induced hazards and risks through various autonomous adaptation strategies. Such practices are sustained and improved over time by succeeding generations and help improve livelihoods, reduce disaster risks to ecosystems, lives and community assets, improve resilience and create adaptation solutions to deal with climate change impacts. They can also help people and their institutions to prepare long-term adaptation strategies, plans and programs. Many of the indigenous knowledge practices can be integrated with scientific knowledge, tools and technologies to support adaptation actions through switching strategies, modifying or transforming existing behaviors while dealing with climatic or non-climatic shocks. Traditional and indigenous practices in the present form will not be able to deal with the shocks that climate change entails without continous support. With multiple stressors at play, which impact of climate does one adapt to? It is a difficult but important question because to establish causal relationship among human-induced climate change, local weather events and its impact is hard. Individuals, households and communities have dealt with natural climatic variability for centuries establishing indigenous and local knowledge practices, which have served the community well and in governance of local natural resource use. Government and donor agencies have used formal scientific knowledge to address development needs and also respond to disaster risk reduction. In responding to climate change challenges both knowledge systems face limitations : a) knowledge about future climate is uncertain, b) context and location specific ILK will become inadequate to deal with low probability high exposure climatic shocks. The challenges present new interface in the knowledge-policy domain with respect to building adaptive capacity and resilience to climate change. The directions for action on adaptation and resilience building must be able to contend with uncertainties of climate change and limitations of ILK highlighted above. For effective climate change adaptation, this study argues that ILK and scientific knowledge must engage each other to generate shared and new knowledge. Developing such knowledge requires greater participation of local agents where adaptation is most needed and where integrating both types of knowledge systems must happen. While science based climate and environmental information are critical for responding to the impacts of climate change, traditional forms of knowledge and the wisdom they offer are useful institutional context for synthesis. Such integration need to (a) promote effective communications of weather and specific hazard information; b) improve mobility during, and in the aftermath of extreme climate events; (c) link women and other traditional groups with local financial institutions to access funds for risk spreading before, during and following extreme climatic events; (d) diversify livelihoods through access to a range of options; (e) provide education on basic language and skills necessary to understand climate change, risk perceptions and livelihood strategies; (f) ensure rights to organize, express voice through diverse public, private and civil society organisations; and (g) synthesize scientific as well as indigenous practices to proactively identify hazards, analyze and minimize risks and attain wellbeing.
2017
Available literature on indigenous and local knowledge provides ample argument and evidence of how indigenous peoples and local communities have been adapting for generations to climate-induced hazards and risks by developing situation-specific livelihood practices and building the resiliency of their households and communities. However, in recent years, increasingly frequent and ferocious climate extremes have revealed the limitations of indigenous and local knowledge and this has motivated local communities to adapt to the new situation by combining indigenous knowledge with modern scientific knowledge systems. In fragile and vulnerable Nepal, the dire need to cope with natural and climatic hazards has, for centuries, led local people to make necessary changes to their institutional and behavioural practices to ensure not only their personal security and that of their environment, but also security in supplies of water, food and energy. Much of this indigenous knowledge was gather...
Climate change is considered to be one of the most serious threats and its impact is felt by the most vulnerable world’s poorest countries including Bangladesh. In particular, ethnic communities, whose livelihoods depend on the use of natural resources, are likely to bear the brunt of adverse impacts. A case study was conducted in a fragile ecosystem of Lawachara national park of Bangladesh, to know the indigenous knowledge of the ethnic communities, how they adapt with the climate change impact by using indigenous knowledge. They use various IK to protect their crops from climate change impact. Thus, government should design policies which will be helpful to make them more resilience to face climate change impact.
2016
Forest-dependent indigenous communities rely on natural resources for their livelihoods, but those are currently under threat due to many factors, including the adverse impact of climate change. The present study looks into climate change-related perception and adaptation strategies of three forest-dependent indigenous communities, namely, Khasia, Tripura and Garo in the Lawachara National Park of Northeastern Bangladesh. Household surveys, focus group discussions, key informant interviews, and observation methods were used to unveil the climatic events, impacts and related adaptations. The events include the change in temperature and rainfall patterns, landslide, soil erosion and flash flood, heavy cold and fog, and natural calamities. Moreover, livelihood problems emanating from these events are the drying up of streams and wells, irregular rainfall, increased dieback and mortality of seedlings, pests, diseases, and the attack of crops by wild animals. Likewise, the reduction of soil moisture content, growing season and crop productivity, landslides, damage of roads and culverts, and increased human diseases are common. This study recognized 29 adaptation strategies and divided them into six management categories, drawing on their local knowledge of the natural resources and other technologies. The study reveals that, although adaptation strategies through land use and land cover changes are not enough to sustain their livelihoods, the tactics help them to reduce the risk of, and increase food security and community resilience against, climate change.
Local Strategies to Build Climate Resilient Communities in Bangladesh
Climate Change and Community Resilience
Climate risksthreaten forests, riverbanks and agriculture communities in Bangladesh. This chapter examines three cases from Bangladesh where local communities have been using innovative methods for addressing these issues. With the pressure of high density of population, Bangladesh’s forest cover has declined to as low as 10.7% despite the fact that 17.5% of the land is designated as forest land. Foresters across Bangladesh find it difficult to protect these lands due to high demand for fuelwood. The first case shows how developing an appropriate market chain is used to reduce pressure on forests. The second case shows how to use traditional knowledge to protect riverbanks from erosion in remote villages by using local and natural materials, reclaim agricultural land and also promote navigation. Given the threat of climate change and possible sea-level rise, these lands will be threatened with permanent waterlogging. The third and final case show how farmers in Bangladesh have used ...