Himalayan Snows: The Himalayas are a mountain range in central Asia, the peaks of these mountains have snow fall throughout the year and only melt once a year. The Himalayan snows melted faster than usual in 2004 therefore causing a rapid increase of water levels in rivers such as the River Ganges.
Monsoon Season: The monsoon season in Bangladesh brings heavy, persist precipitation, this creates large amounts of surface water and run off causing soil erosion.
Monsoon season
Deforestation: Deforestation is happening throughout Bangladesh but mainly in the region of Dhaka, but also in other countries such as Tibet and Nepal as of an increase in population is having a direct impact on those further down the rivers. Deforestation causes several problems for the world as trees are used for paper and fire wood, which is not good for the environment. But more so, for the country it’s self, they are putting themselves at more of a risk of flooding as deforestation causes more surface run off with the nock on effect of faster soil erosion, this has a later effect of desertification if there is a lack of rainfall, but this will not happen in Bangladesh.
Global Warming: This is a major factor in this area as it will determine the speed of the melting rate of the Himalayan snows. The water cycle will have a key role in this too, as the more water is evaporated, the more water to fall to cause surface run off and accumulate in areas causing flooding. In the monsoon season, as evaporation of the accumulated water happens over an extended period of time. This will cause water levels to rise in the three main rivers on Bangladesh (Ganges, Jaimuna and Meghna) having an increasing risk of flooding.
Agricultural Irrigation: Farmers irrigate their farm land with river water; they divert the water using small shallow canals to feed crops so they can thrive. But this does more harm than good as this takes away the silt from the river preventing the build up on the deltas further down the river to build up.
Image showing farm and trading land submerged by flood waters.
Economical Impacts
Bangladesh being a LEDC the economic climate was not the best, and the floods did not help this matter. Bangladesh’s infrastructure was severely hit; there was in excess of $7bn worth of damage to roads, railways, bridges which connected remote communities, along with electricity supplies, waste management and sanitation facilities. Millions of jobs were lost; the sector most hit was the agricultural sector as it employed over half of the working population in Bangladesh. Along with that, over 500.000 tonnes of rice crops were ruined; rice is a main food source in the country and supplies were diminishing. This lead the Bangladeshi government to plead with international relief charities such as Water Aid, who played a big role in the Bangladesh floods, and other countries to send aid and “any kind of assistance” The cost of repairs was greater in Urban areas as there was more to repair such as major infrastructural interfaces for example important connecting motorways and train lines, communication methods and electricity lines. The cost was higher as in rural areas of Bangladesh the density of the infrastructural interfaces is low compared to urban areas.
Environmental Impacts
Bangladesh has three main rivers flowing through the country, Ganges, Jaimuna and the Meghna, due to the three times the average rainfall in the monsoon season the river Ganges and Meghna swelled causing flooding in close by communities and areas.
Social Impacts
Due to the severity of the floods 160 million people were forced out of their homes which were situated on low lying ground, only half a million people were sheltered in make shift accommodation. With sanction facilities and waste management facilities being flooded too, the contaminated products were released into the flood water making everyone at risk of disease. 24% of the reported deaths were related to water prone diseases such as Gastroenteritis along with diarrhoea infections which killed 110, 000 children under the under the age of 5. Arsenic was in water sources in over 61 regions in Bangladesh posing a risk to over 30 million people. With relief efforts still going on 3 months after the floods had gone, people still needed help to rehabilitate their lives in December. Over 100,000 people contracted diarrhoea; this again posed a threat to others as it would have contaminated the flood water even more, putting others at risk of catching the contagious infection. More than 800 people died in the Bangladesh floods by mid- September by drowning, disease, snake bites or houses collapsing.
The preparation by the Bangladeshi government was poor as they could learned from past major floods (floods in 1998) on how to cope with the swells of water and changed their management strategies towards how they carry out relief work better. Also to secure waste facilities to reduce the risk of diseases and infection caught in contaminated waters to reduce the amount of deaths and to relive the strain on hospital workers. Along with that, the government need to invest money into flood prevention systems as it will save a lot of money in the long term.
