Mongla, a secondary city in Bangladesh's southwest, is highly vulnerable to climate change. Its location, surrounded by tidal rivers and near the Sundarbans, exposes it to rising salinity, coastal erosion, and increased cyclone risk. These conditions make traditional livelihoods, such as farming and fishing, unsustainable, pushing residents to leave their homes.
Simultaneously, Mongla is developing into an economic centre. The reopening of Mongla Port and the success of the Export Processing Zone (EPZ) are attracting industries. Enhanced connectivity, particularly with the Padma Bridge, has further increased its appeal. This economic growth is attracting both climate-displaced people and those seeking better opportunities. As a result, Mongla is experiencing a unique urbanization pattern, functioning as both a refuge and a rapidly growing economic hub.
For migrants settling into Mongla's urban centres, life is far from easy. They face a double challenge: A severe shortage of essential services and the relentless impacts of climate stressors like rising sea levels and extreme weather. Consider Narikeltola, a community of 190 individuals. After losing their homes to cyclone Aila in 2009, they were relocated here by the local government. But resources have always been scarce, leaving them trapped between scarcity and climatic pressures. Water, in particular, is a precious and costly resource due to salinity. A large pond sits at the heart of the community, but it becomes salty and unusable during the dry season. Women have no choice but to undertake a gruelling 4-kilometre journey -- on foot or by boat -- for just one pitcher of water.
“Fetching water means rowing a boat or walking for hours,” says Fahima, a resident. “It is exhausting and leaves little time for anything else.” Water scarcity tops their list of woes, but it is just one of many climate-related struggles they face daily. Yet, despite these hardships, the people of Narikeltola hold onto hope with a gracious smile, believing relief is near.
It is understandable that resources will be limited for unique communities with rehabilitation cases like Narikeltola. This means residents must take the initiative and assume responsibility for their development efforts, ensuring limited resources are optimised for maximum impact. The locally led adaptation (LLA) approach is a suitable and effective strategy to foster a sense of accountability and responsibility. It ensures solutions are tailored to address their specific needs and identifies them as the driving agents of their community’s positive changes, fostering a sense of accountability.
However, this approach is not just about identifying problems; it is a dynamic process prioritizing people-driven solutions. It involves local residents assessing hazard trends, pinpointing climate-vulnerable hotspots, cataloging vulnerabilities, and crafting interventions that meet their unique needs. These plans are then validated by local leaders, municipalities, and administrative bodies, ensuring they are credible, actionable, and widely supported.
The project, a collaboration between the BRAC Urban Development Program, the Global Centre on Adaptation (GCA), and the FCDO, is implementing locally led adaptation in Bangladesh's secondary cities. This project aligns with the inferential decisions of the guiding documents like the National Adaptation Plan's directives of easing population influx to megacities like Dhaka. It focuses on investing in secondary cities through improved planning and resource leveraging to build climate resilience and migrant-friendly environments.
In Mongla, the project initially identified 56 climate-vulnerable communities. Following extensive discussions with community members, advisory committees, and the municipality, 36 informal settlements were shortlisted based on climate vulnerability, tenure security, urban informality, and the presence of climate migrants. Later, through focused group discussions, the 20 most climate-vulnerable informal settlements, including Narikeltola, were identified. These communities underwent a rigorous scientific assessment using vulnerability indexing based on Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) indicators. The final selection of these communities was cross-referenced with local insights and validated by stakeholders to ensure relevance.
Narikeltola is one of 20 communities in Mongla that developed a climate adaptation plan for their locality. Initially, there was a capacity-building session with the community where the project team and Narikeltola established common terminologies for the climatic issues they faced. Local leaders and the municipality later validated these plans. Considering the magnitude of the water crisis, the plan initially prioritized measures to minimize this. The plans included reviving the community pond, installing a community rainwater harvesting (RWH) plant, and setting up a pond sand filter (PSF).
The people of Narikeltola actively advocated for implementing their curated plan to different stakeholders. Convinced by the negotiations of community members from Narikeltola, the project assisted them in their journey towards adaptation and water security. Residents played an active role in every step, from selecting the location to supervising construction.
The path was not easy. Reviving the pond involved intense excavation and logistical hurdles. “At one point, the entire area became so muddy that we couldn’t even walk between our houses,” Fahima recalls. “But we kept reminding ourselves why we were doing this.”
After the long toiling phase of construction, Narikeltola stands transformed today. The re-excavated pond and installed PSF provide fresh water, and the rainwater harvesting plant ensures a steady supply during the dry season. Families no longer spend hours collecting water, enabling them to focus on education, work, and family life. The pond has also fostered new livelihood opportunities, with residents cultivating vegetables along its banks. The ripples of this initiative have reached the adjacent communities as they are also collecting the water from here that meets their daily needs.
To institutionalize this progress, the community established a water management committee overseeing water distribution, conducting quality checks, and maintaining facilities. Their growing confidence also empowered them to successfully advocate for additional municipal support, leading to the construction of family-based toilets. This achievement reflects their increasing self-reliance and problem-solving capacity. Looking ahead, the community envisions a sustainable business model for PSF water, ensuring both accessibility and financial viability.
On this occasion of World Water Day 2025, we want to celebrate the accomplishments of the Narikeltola community. Narikeltola's transformation is not just a story of a group of people fixing their water-related issue; instead, it is a story of empowerment, ownership, and lasting change. By actively participating in every stage of the process, residents have developed a deep sense of accountability, ensuring the long-term sustainability of these solutions.
The adaptation plans in Mongla are now fully functional, and the municipality is implementing them. The initiative aims to scale up this successful process and promote climate resilience in urban areas nationwide in the coming years.
This story highlights how people's participation in planning creates integrated plans at the community, ward, and city levels. As Bangladesh faces the growing impacts of climate change, stories like Narikeltola remind us of the strength we possess. Together, we can build a future where every community has the resources and resilience to thrive.
Abu Nayeem Md Shakib is Deputy Manager, Urban Development Program, BRAC. Shahriar Mohammad Farhad is Project Coordinator, Urban Development Program, BRAC.