Experts for ecosystem-based approaches in coastal belts

Environmental experts at a symposium in the city Sunday stressed introducing ecosystem-based approaches in the country' s coastal regions to cope with the climate change impacts and make the coastal communities climate-resilient ones, reports UNB.
Coastal communities in many parts of Asia, including Bangladesh, are particularly vulnerable to climate change, with increased severity of extreme wealth events directly affecting their lives and resources, they said.
The experts said healthy coastal ecosystems, including healthy mangrove forests, play a vital role in helping the coastal communities adapt to climate change, and ecosystem-based approaches can make a major contribution to the coastal community resilience.
The Mangroves For the Future (MFF) in collaboration with IUCN project -- Ecosystems for Life: A Bangladesh-India Initiative--organised a two-day regional symposium on Coastal Community Resilience at a city hotel, aiming to obtain knowledge from other countries in South and Southeast Asia and share lessons and practical solutions for tackling complex coastal issues.
Environment and Forests Minister Anwar Hossain Manju, Environment and Forests Secretary Shafiqur Rahman Patwari, Chief Conservator of Forests Yunus Ali, IUCN Country Representative Ishtiaq Uddin Ahmad and MFF Senior Adviser Dr Don Macintosh, spoke at the inaugural session of the symposium.
Anwar Hossain Manju said understanding how people living in coastal communities cope with climate-related hazards and other problems can help the policymakers design more proactive and comprehensive policies to support coastal communities' resilience in the future.
Emphasising coastal management, he said about two million tonnes of silt falls in the Bay of Bengal each year which may create another Bangladesh-size landmass.