Tidal River Management in Bangladesh - part I

Until December 2012, Jan van Minnen and I will perform MSc thesis research in Dhaka and Khulna, Bangladesh. Fundamentally, our goal is to find if and how Tidal River Management can contribute to relieving problems related to drainage congestion in the Southwest Delta.

In the 1950s, polders were constructed in the tidal southwest delta of Bangladesh to decrease flood vulnerability, increase food production and to promote socio-economic development of the area. Old floodplains were transformed into polders and became highly productive agricultural areas. However, river sedimentation started to occur and as of the 1980s drainage congestion started to occur. This led to widespread socio-economic problems and the loss of livelihoods.

In 1990, farmers at Beel (polder) Dakatia cut the embankment of their polder in order to increase drainage congestion. This strategy has been named Tidal River Management afterwards, and is based on increasing tidal prism (the volume of water entering and leaving the delta between high and low tide) to increasing river flow, which results in the transport of sediment from the river to the polder.

The ultimate question is whether Tidal River Management can be regarded a sustainable strategy to decrease the problems related to drainage congestion in the SW delta. Can Tidal River Management increase flood resilience and contribute to socio-economic development of the impoverished southwest delta of Bangladesh?

To be continued soon…!