Strengthening the coping capacity of the vulnerable people facing challenges with the adverse effects of climate change

The project builds community resilience in the southwest coastal areas of Bangladesh by implementing a threefold community-led holistic approach that includes:

• Capacity building of local women-led organisations in mainstreaming climate change adaptation into their strategies, and policies and putting these into practice at the field level.
• Reinforcement of the coping capacity of the community (including adolescents and youth) to reduce the risks on their lives and livelihoods in a climate-vulnerable context.
• Dissemination of learning and good practices at local, national, and global levels for large-scale replication.

Climate change exacerbates the geographical distinctiveness of Bangladesh's southwest coastal regions, resulting in various challenges such as rising temperatures, erratic rainfall, flooding, salinity, water logging, soil erosion, and the amplified impact of natural disasters like flooding and cyclones.

It is crucial to reinforce the adaptation capacities of local populations, via a variety of strategies that take into consideration gender dynamics and community cohesion. Women and children in particular face difficulties in having their rights enforced due to climate vulnerability.

• Informative education
• Empowering advocacy
• Building resilience
• Innovative solutions and skills

Informative education

• Workshop on organizational capacity needs assessment (for women-led local organisations).
• Workshop on policy formation/reformation/adaption (for women-led local organisations).
• Support implementing partner for continuous review and development of the policies (women-led local organisations).
• Training on climate change for the staff of implementing partners.
• Conduct orientation for the staff of implementing partners on upgraded/new policies and strategies.
• Organize orientation for the implementing partners on resource mobilization and mainstreaming climate change.
• Organize exchange visit for learning and implementation.
• Training on resource mobilization for the community development women group (CDWG) set up through the project.

Empowering advocacy

• Form student brigades at higher secondary/college level.
• Conduct orientation to student brigade on climate change, its impacts, and adaptive measures.
• Monthly meeting of student brigades.
• Conduct awareness campaign (by student brigades).
• Youth-led social media campaign.

Building resilience

• Organize workshop on service mapping and formation of climate change network platform at local level.
• Quarterly meeting with the network members.
• Organize yearly climate conferences at the regional level.
• Organize dialogue with government and non-government stakeholders including donors.
• Orientation to the network members on the national and global policies, acts, and other instruments.
• Formations of Community Development Women's Group (CDWG).
• Facilitate community risk assessment and risk mitigation action plan.
• Bi-monthly meeting of CDWG.
• Support CDWG to demonstrate climate smart technologies (off-fairm, on-fairm) and reproductive health practices.

Innovative solutions and skills

• Identification and documentation of good practices on climate change actions.
• Good practice sharing meeting at the community level.
• Media conference for good practice sharing at the regional level.
• Support the implementing partners to present the climate change issues and good practices at national and global levels.