Deltanet conference in Ghent

Last Monday, Dynamic Deltas team members Jeroen Warner, Arjen Zegwaard and myself joined the Deltanet international conference on interregional cooperation between European deltas. Deltanet is an EU-funded programme to stimulate knowledge exchange between deltas in Spain/Portugal, Belgium/the Netherlands, UK, Romania, Germany and Poland.

It was quite nice to hear, for example, stories about the Schelde from the Belgian perspective. Usually Dutch people (with myself as a now outdated example...) tend to think about the Southwestern Delta only in terms of Dutch issues: 1953 flood, Hedwigepolder, nature development/coastal protection, water quality issues in the Volkerrak, sedimentation issues, salt water intrusion. But ofcourse also across the border, many issues are going on and plans are being developed to deal with them. See for example the Belgian Sigma plan. This needs international collaboration in order to work according to an integrated approach.

Next to that I could (re-)establish links with persons working in the Danube delta, the Ebro delta, and the Minho delta. So far, the programme will end March next year but the consortium partners are now thinking and working on applying for a next phase.

Ofcourse a visit to Ghent could not be limited to just going and coming back the same day (which is in logistical terms almost impossible). So we went already on Sunday afternoon, enjoyed a Ghent stoofvlees dish with Belgian beer (picture by Arjen) and slept in an old monastry, to complete the 'total experience'.

Dreams

“Rahman dreamed of the reclamation of kilometers of fertile land from the sea. He dreamed that the Ganges Delta would be never be hit by those terrible floods. That Bangladesh’s golden people would forever be safe behind high dikes. Dikes, delta, land reclamation from sea: the Netherlands! It was a dream with a logical consequence. Only one country in the world was able to help Rahman with his vision: the Netherlands!”(source: Springer, 1990; translated from Dutch)

The above was written by the first ambassador of the Netherlands in Bangladesh after a conversation with Bangladesh’ first president, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, in 1972. Many interventions later, including the famous Flood Action plan that was the result of deadly floods of the late 1980s, one has to conclude that perhaps, PERHAPS, there is a tiny chance that Rahman’s “dream” should not be taken too seriously.

In fact, I’m quite sure it should not, because it is 1) not realistic and 2) can even have negative consequences for some areas in Bangladesh.

First, is it realistic to believe that it is possible to control all the forces of nature that are exerted on the immensely dynamic delta of Bangladesh? The Ganges, Brahmaputra and Meghna are among the largest rivers in the world, continuously eroding and creating land. Actually: the net sedimentation that is deposited by these rivers have made Bangladesh; have risen the country out of the ocean.

Second, floods are essential to keeping Bangladesh alive. Not only are seasonal floods essential for irrigation and fertilization, controlled flooding can also keep existing river systems alive.

In the southwest delta of Bangladesh, where tidal rivers are rapidly sedimenting up, the creation of tidal basins (depoldering) helps keep river systems alive by 1) keeping river flow relatively high and 2) by redirecting the sediment deposition from the river to the areas that are temporarily inundated. This, in a nutshell, is called “Tidal River Management”.

So, should Bangladesh battle water and build enormous dikes, dredge and poor concrete? Perhaps in some urban areas this might be helpful, but overall this is not be the right mindset to tackle water related problems.

In the southwest delta, it is all about the management of water and silt. The false belief of many people (mainly engineers and dredgers) that water can be controlled with concrete and pumps and big dredgers should be taken into serious consideration.

In his book Can Bangladesh be protected from floods?, Hugh Brammer concludes that Bangladesh cannot be, and it most probably will never be. And it shouldn’t be, because floods are Bangladesh. It has created this country and, with good management, will also ensure its survival in the future.

NL MoFA move to invest more in waterrelated DRR

The department of Humanitarian Relief of the Foreign Affairs Ministry recently formulated a concrete ambition in the field of Disaster Risk Reduction: in accordance with international agreements, 10% of the humanitarian relief assistance should be invested in DRR (see doc, in Dutch). The rationale is to invest beforehand in the reduction of risks, instead of only responding to a crisis. This is an interesting, and fruitful, development.

I was happy to be invited by the ministry for a meeting yesterday to informally discuss and brainstorm about the approach and options to invest disaster risk reduction activities in water management. I could not resist to translate this into possible activities in the field of flood risk management in deltas ;p. Participants liked the ideas and to name a specific outcome, it was recommended to develop 10 long term Delta Visions for at least 10 world deltas, to advise on integrated holistic approaches and flood risk management activities, supported by Dutch know-how and expertise. Also we discussed about options for urbanized delta areas, for example in the field of water and sanitation.

Participants included representatives from DME (the ‘water’ department), DSH (stability and humanitarian relief), the Red Cross and the Red Cross Climate Center, Deltares, and the Delta Commissioner’s staff and we are likely to get together again the coming months.

Nuance?

Website Dutch newspaper 'de Telegraaf':

Drinking water shortage threat

Website Dutch newspaper 'NRC':

RIVM (national institute for public health and the environment) is worried about our drinking water in case of extreme drought.

Here's the original report, a little bit more specific, called "Effects of climate change on water quality at drinking water abstraction points : Analysis of concentrations of substances"