This year, one-third of Pakistan was submerged due to massive floods caused by climate change, affecting 33 million people. The floods  left 75,000 people without access to safe housing and 5.5 million people without access to drinking water. Local communities and small farmers have lost everything including their food storage, their homes, seeds for the next planting, their farming tools, cooking utensils and their animals. Hunger and malnutrition are rampant and some have to leave their homes and stay in schools, with relatives or at the roadside, as the government was unable to respond adequately to the disaster. Roots for Equity, a local civil society organisation (CSO), and Pakistan Kissan Mazdoor Tehreek (PKMT), a peasant movement, continue to work tirelessly to provide relief and rehabilitation by supporting agroecology and the rights of farmers.

Meanwhile in Bangladesh, also one of the countries most vulnerable to climate change, rising seas and floods are seriously affecting the agriculture and livelihoods of farming communities. Peasant farmers are forced to leave their farms and migrate for survival. The Community Enterprise Approach (CEA) is an initiative of SHISUK, a local CSO which strengthens community action by building bunds to connect the villages and to regulate the flood water during the monsoon season. The enterprise also helps to build entrepreneurship among the community members, developing value chains for fisheries and agriculture products, including processing and marketing. Besides income generation and turning the untapped floodplains into a profitable resource, community enterprise has strengthened the collective decision-making and governance for resilient community building.  

This session will provide an overview of the climate crisis in these countries and the need for global and national policies. Speakers will share how the crisis in Pakistan devastated the country and the efforts that farmers have made to rehabilitate their communities with agroecology. Speakers from Bangladesh will share how they have used the floods to create a sustainable community development initiative.