Community-based Early Warning
Minimising flood risk and damage
Like on many occasions in the past, Bangladesh suffered colossal loss and damages, particularly in terms of assets, due to flood this year too. Unless some specific and effective measures are adopted the situation is likely to continue posing a permanent threat to our economy. Bangladesh, the largest deltaic region in the world, is located at the downstream end of two of the world's largest rivers, the Ganges and the Brahmaputra (Jamuna), both originating in the great mountain range of the Himalayas. The origin of the third longest river of the country, the Meghna, is also outside Bangladesh. About 93 percent of the catchment area of these rivers lies outside of the country's boundary, mainly in India. During the rainy season waters from a zone with an area equivalent to eleven times of the total area of Bangladesh flows into the Bay of Bengal through our territories making the country permanently prone to floods. We cannot prevent floods with our currently available resources, but we can cope with it and minimise the losses by adopting different measures. The initial results of an USAID funded pilot project on flood warning, now being implemented in two selected upazilas of the country, indicate that timely warning followed by preparedness measures may play an effective role in reducing losses due to flood. The project has been briefly discussed later. Living in Bangladesh without getting prepared to cope with flood means exposing yourself to a formidable danger, which has the potentiality to cause extensive damage to lives and properties, and thereby inviting a series of unbearable sorrows and sufferings. Flood is nothing new to the people of Bangladesh. Our forefathers had to live with flood and we are also destined to live with it as no human power can resist or prevent natural calamities. Moreover, in view of the present economic condition of the country we cannot even think of any structural measures to cope with flood... The best way to survive and overcome the sufferings, being posed by the occurrence of flood almost every year, is to build a capacity to cope with flood and get well prepared much before the advent of flood. The equation is very simple, the greater is our coping capacity and preparedness, the lower is the risk and scale of damages. But for getting prepared against a hazard or disaster, one must get a clear idea about its strength and velocity and the actual time when it would come and hit. This is hundred percent true about flood in Bangladesh. If the people can have a clear idea about the time of occurrence of flood and the velocity with which it would hit, it would be possible to adopt preparedness measures right on time and successfully cope with it. In this case non-structural measures can be highly effective in mitigating the damaging impact of flood and that flood forecasting and warnings, in view of their favourable cost-benefit ratio, are the most appropriate means to achieve this goal. Now the question naturally arises if we are doing anything practically in this field and if so what have we done so far and what can we do in the coming years in achieving a permanent solution to this old and lingering problem. We cannot leave this problem unsolved any more as it is a question of life and death for us. We must act now and act with all seriousness. Fortunately a beginning has been made in this field by undertaking a USAID funded pilot project titled 'Community-based Flood Information System (CFIS)' now being implemented in two small areas comprising about 650 selected households under the Dawlatpur and Nagarpur upazila of the districts of Manikgonj and Tangail respectively. Considering the importance of the subject, the project deserves a bit of elaboration to throw some light on the progress of implementation and the success achieved so far towards reaching the project goal. Many things towards finding a solution to this problem would depend on the success or otherwise of this project. The five-year pilot project funded by the USAID through the River Technology Institute (RTI) of the United States was initiated in 2003 and the implementation work would be completed by the end of the current year. The rationale behind selecting the households from the above mentioned two upazilas of two districts is that these areas are inundated every year even during normal flooding... The project is being implemented jointly by the Bangladesh Disaster Preparedness Centre (BDPC) and the Centre for Environmental and Geographic Information Services (CEGIS). BDPC is specially responsible for disseminating the flood warning at family and community level based on the information provided by the CEGIS. For general information of the readers it may be noted here that the FFWC under the Bangladesh Water Development Board (BWDB) under the Water Resource Ministry was established immediately after the independence for dissemination of flood forecast and warning nationally and till now it is playing an important role in this field. The FFWC disseminates warning messages mainly through the electronic media which is still not within the reach of all the grassroots level people who are extremely poor. The other problem inherent in this system is that it is not possible on the part of the FFWC to disseminate area specific flood warning. Moreover, it is difficult for the common rural people to properly understand and interpret the warning messages disseminated centrally. As a result most of the people of the highly flood prone areas cannot derive any benefit out of those warning messages. So, they are still compelled to develop their cultivation and harvesting plan on the basis of their indigenous knowledge and expertise. The implementation strategy and modus operandi developed by BDPC seems to be effective and pragmatic. In the implementation process the participation of all the vulnerable people, local government bodies, local NGOs and national level expert organisations has been ensured. In designing the project due consideration was given to the issues like sustainability, affordability and participation of all the stakeholders. The most important thing is that BDPC has made the dissemination system most easy to make it understandable to all the grassroots people irrespective of their level of education. By using flags of only two colours, blue and white, the messages are being disseminated and these are well received. Blue is used to indicate the increase in the water level while decrease in the water level is indicated by using white. The maximum number of flags, either blue or white, is two only. One blue flag means water level may go up by 'half hand' (9"), while two flags would mean increase by one hand (18"). Similarly, white flag would mean decrease in the same way. No flag means that status-quo will prevail. This warning is valid for 24 hours. Four flag operators have been identified by the local stakeholders in consultation with BDPC personnel for the project intervention area and they disseminate the messages received from the CEGIS directly or through the UDMC. The availability of mobile phones in the rural areas has made the dissemination process easy. All the change agents (community trusted people like religious persons, school teachers etc.) responsible for the job, fortunately, have mobile phones while two mobile sets have been given, one each to UzDMC and UDMC, by BDPC making the system smooth and leak proof. People may also get hour to hour development through the flood marker installed at different key points under the project. In the flood marker, three colours are used -- green, yellow and red. Green would mean that the situation is normal, yellow would indicate moderate danger and urgency of adopting preparedness measures and the red colour would indicate great danger and need of immediate action. Simplification of the flood forecasting warnings system has generated great interest about the matter among the people of all walks of life. Occasionally they could listen to different early warnings through Radio and TV previously too, but those were almost meaningless to them for mainly two reasons. Firstly, all of them do not have equal access to these electronic media and secondly, the language of the warning messages was not easily understandable to them. So, in most of the cases they, even on receipt of the messages, remained unprepared as they ignored the messages. Now, in the intervention area of the pilot project, the situation is quite different. The community receive the messages from their own people, their neighbours. So, there is no credibility or communication gap. They can see the warning flag, hoisted by one of their neighbours, sitting at their own homes and they also know the meaning which the flag carries. This qualitative change in the language and method of the dissemination system has brought about a change in the mindset of the local community. As the flood season approaches, the people eagerly keep watch on the situation and remain alert about the flag. This change in the mindset of the people, their interest to know and act accordingly, is one of the major successes of the project. Our past experience is that the generalised flood warning messages, in most of the cases, prove less effective or not effective at all as people are psychologically less responsive to those messages. Proximity plays an important role in the field of successful and effective communication. As the generalised messages are not area specific, they logically cannot create the desired level of interest among the people of a particular area. Naturally, the people would pay maximum heed to an announcement or warning message if that is directly related with their own area or locality. In view of this accepted reality, the warning message dissemination strategies and mythologies, now being practiced in the project intervention areas, deserve replication in other flood prone zones of the country. >Syed Sadiqur Rahman is a former member of BCS (Inf.) Cadre.
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