Khulna Essay

Background

UN-HABITAT’s State of the World’s Cities (2008–09) reports the study by the Center for Urban Studies (CUS), Bangladesh (2006) which shows that slum settlements in Bangladesh are already most vulnerable during cyclones and heavy rainfall. In Bangladesh, only 10 percent of slum dwellers have sufficient drainage to avoid water-logging during heavy rains (Islam, 2005). More than 50 percent of the slum clusters are typically fully flooded or partially flooded when the country experienced floods due to moderate-to-heavy rainfall during the rainy season (CUS, MEASURE Evaluation and NIPRT, 2006). Climate change and rising sea levels would make these areas more vulnerable to flooding.

Khulna is the third largest city of Bangladesh. Nationally

As Figure 2 shows, in these settlements climate variability has mostly indirect effects. As Khulna is a major city, whenever climate variability causes a major natural disaster, i.e. whenever sudden onset events take place, people tend to leave their villages and migrate to Khulna to find jobs and secure their livelihoods. The failure of infrastructure and services to expand in line with expanding populations has an adverse effect on the lives of the settlement dwellers. Regular weather events also create problems for. Too much rain not only disrupts their livelihood activities, but also creates problems in their dwelling places. Waste-disposal tanks or ditches overflow and disrupt the drainage system. As such, slow-onset events directly affect the people living in these

Frequent power outage exacerbates their suffering. Higher temperatures also increase the spread of diseases, such as fever, diarrhea and headaches. To minimize the impacts of heat stress, men and women of all ages spend time outdoors, with many sleeping outside at night. In summer a related problem is that people cannot store food, even for a few hours. As they only cook once a day, sometimes they eat semi-rotten food, often resulting in gastro-intestinal problems and other related illness. This is a common scenario throughout every rainy season, affecting nearly all households. Nevertheless, the surrounding water bodies become a destination of all sorts of waste and a source of air and water pollution. Hot and humid conditions make this water a breeding place for mosquitoes and other disease vectors. People also complained about aggravated levels of respiratory disease during severe cold weather. The suffering of those with rheumatic fever worsens in the winter. The settlements have lower relative elevation compared to the surrounding area, which increases the risk of inundation and water-logging. Inadequate and improper drainage systems compound the problem, resulting in frequent and prolonged water-logging incidents. If the logged water is polluted, which is invariably the case, the spread of waterborne disease could affect people’s recovery process. Due to high population density and a