The European Commission has reportedly decided to provide an additional one million Euros for the most vulnerable families affected by flash-floods in north-western Bangladesh. This fund is in addition to 1.64 million Euros. This total amount of 2.64 million Euros will be spent for 0.2 million poor flood-affected households in north-western Bangladesh so that they can survive after their Aman crop loss during the last flash-flood.
The Northwest of Bangladesh is situated in the Brahmaputra basin. It is also crisscrossed by the rivers Teesta and Dharola. In the last 10 years six floods struck the region. Four of them taking place in 2004, 2007, 2012 and 2014 were catastrophic. Evidence indicates that the frequency of floods has increased due to the impact of climate change. Paddy in this area is the main crop providing food and employment for thousands of farm families living at the subsistence level. But paddy cultivation in this area is now coming under threat because of the increased flash-floods, droughts and river erosion. Only in greater Rangpur districts around 23 thousand hectares of Aman crops were totally damaged by flash-floods in 2004 while 44 thousand hectares in 2007, thirty-two thousand hectares damaged in 2012 and thirty-seven thousand hectares in 2014.
This flash-flood affected most of the low-lying districts in northwest Bangladesh during the last monsoon. Most of the Aman paddy fields were fully or partially damaged due to around 15-19 days of submergence. In a countrywide inundation report circulated by the Ministry of Disaster Management and Relief it was pointed out that most of the low-lying areas in the entire northwestern region were inundated by the last flash flood. In the report it was also mentioned that more than 0.1 million households were affected by the flash-floods in the northwest region while more than 0.1 million hectares of Aman paddy were fully or partially damaged in the region. That means farm households lost more than 0.20-0.25 million tonnes of paddy. It is definitely alarming for the country's food security.
As an impact of climate change, nowadays flash flood is posing a big threat to production of Aman paddy, which is the most important crop in Bangladesh, when it comes to the nation's food security. Due to climate change, flash floods now occur almost every year during the monsoon. Even this flash flood occurs twice or thrice in the same monsoon. On the other hand, due to heavy silt deposit, most of the rivers have lost their depth causing disruption in navigability year after year. Thus, just after a continuous rainfall during monsoon, these rivers overflow their banks and inundate adjoining fields. As a result, most of the standing paddy crops remain inundated for about 1-2 weeks, causing extensive damage to Aman production.
The Bangladesh Rice Research Institute (BRRI) and the Bangladesh Institute of Nuclear Agriculture (BINA) under a joint collaboration with the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI) have developed submergence-tolerant rice varieties which can withstand submergence up to 15 days while other existing rice varieties succumb to submergence for 4 to 6 days only. The submergence-tolerant rice varieties have the submergence gene (Sub1) that helps crop renew its growth after the water recedes. After conducting a number of field trials in flood-prone and other areas in Bangladesh, the National Seed Board of Bangladesh government has officially released four submergence-tolerant rice varieties named BRRI dhan51 and BRRI dhan52 developed by the BRRI in 2010. On the other hand, the Binadhan-11 and Binadhan12 were developed by BINA in 2013 to enable farmers to cultivate these varieties on a larger scale.
Considering the geographical vulnerability, the STRASA (Stress Tolerant Rice in Africa and South-Asia) project, which was supported by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, carried out a number of experiments with the submergence-tolerant rice varieties at the farmers' level in flash-flood-affected areas. During the last couple of years, the IRRI-STRASA project along with government organisations like the DAE and non-government organisations (NGOs) like RDRS, Solidarity, etc. conducted demonstration trials. The experiment showed that most of the submergence-tolerant paddy varieties that remained fully inundated for around 15 days in the monsoon survived well without any apparent damage and farmers harvested more than four tonnes of yield per hectare, though other traditional (non-submergence-tolerant) rice varieties in the same areas were fully or partially damaged and quite often required re-transplanting. Just immediately after recession of floodwater that stayed for 15 days, these submergence-tolerant rice plants grow new shoots.
Now the farmers of flash flood-affected areas required to be helped in cultivating the newly-developed four submergence tolerant rice varieties so that the farmers can ensure food security at the household level. The government also should come forward with a comprehensive programme in flash flood-affected areas. Although the two submergence-tolerant rice varieties were released in 2010, the government is yet to take any initiative that is much important, when farm households lose their rice crops almost every monsoon. It is now an urgent task of the government to take an immediate initiative so that farm households of flash flood-prone areas in northern Bangladesh get available seeds of these rice varieties.
The newly-released varieties like Binadhan-11 and Binadhan-12 harvested last October are comparatively of short duration. So, the farmers can go for cultivation of potato, wheat, maize, mustard, winter vegetables, etc. at the right time-in early November-and ensure higher yield with reduced production cost of the winter crops. The field performance of Binadhan-11 and Binadhan-12 in flash flood conditions was also outstanding. Last year it was the first time for the farmers to see Binadhan-11 and Binadhan-12 fully recover from 15-17 days of complete submergence and survived easily without having any apparent damage.
With the assistance from BMGF (Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation), the STRASA project supporting the farmers who were involved with this technology are now very happy with the outcome and they are continuing the technology for the following year on their own. These submergence-tolerant rice varieties are now attracting attention of the entire farmer community. Farmers now call it a miracle rice variety, which both farmers and farm labourers are benefiting from. The donors and NGOs along with concerned government agencies should come up and appreciate the potential of this rice cultivation technology.
Dr. M.G. Neogi is Consultant
at the International
Rice Research Institute (IRRI)
mgneogi@gmail.com
Submergence-tolerant rice battling climate change
M. G. Neogi | Published: January 03, 2015 00:00:00 | Updated: November 30, 2026 06:01:00
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