Char land is abundant with crops, fish and natural resources which are damaged by early flood and river erosion every year. The early flood comes from the upstream of the Ganges and Jamuna Rivers. Due to these floods acres of agricultural land are destroyed every year. This negatively impacts the country’s national economy and food security is under threat as well. On the other hand, climate change has accelerated the negative impacts to some extent due to the increased frequency and intensity of natural disasters. This crisis is becoming severe as a result of the river erosion and unplanned development in the upstream. However, the youths of Char land have strongly demanded to allocate global climate fund to protect this char land and people from the climate induced disasters. They made this demand in the ‘Char Youth Climate Conference 2023’ which was held in Harirampur of Manikgonj district arranged by BARCIK on 13 November, 2023. The youth also demanded to stop unplanned destructive development activities in the upper regions.
The climate conference was held on 13 November 2023 at the Horirampur Char land (Patgram Char land) under Manikganj District which are severely affected by river erosion’ irregular rainfall ‘cropland siltation’ uneven flood’ drought etc. The conference was jointly organized by Bangladesh Resource Centre for Indigenous Knowledge (BARCIK), a national environment award winner NGO, and Manikganj Jubo Samaj, and char land people. In this day-long conference, climate affected farmers, fisher folk, youths and other professional people described regarding the negative impacts of climate induced disasters on their life and livelihoods. They urged to state and international communities to compensate their loss and damages. “Char-Bandhan (solidarity with Char land)” was also held standing on the ruined land by the sand with festoons bearing various slogans to protect the livelihood, ecosystems and culture of Char Land.
Diverse agricultural crops, climate tolerant indigenous rice varieties from the char lands, were displayed in the conference. In addition, this plastic-free conference held throughout the day which included traditional cultural performances of songs, dances and char land songs. People of different ages and professions of char areas jointly inaugurated this conference.
Speakers in the event said that due to climate change, devastating flood and erratic rainfall have increased creating problems to their livelihoods and damaging their crops. Char people are not responsible to climate change, but they are victim of this. The global leaders of the rich and developed countries responsible for climate change have promised to create a global climate fund, but have repeatedly ignored their promise. People of the Char land demanded that the global climate fund should be formed at the upcoming Dubai Climate Conference 2023. They also demanded that loss and damage issues of Char land area have to be taken into account and initiative should be taken to allocate global climate funds to char areas to combat the adverse impact and effect of climate change.
