GED 1104: Bangladesh Studies

Lecture 1
Mohammad Bellal Hossain
Associate Professor & Chairperson
Department of Population Sciences
University of Dhaka
Dhaka-1000, Bangladesh
Email: [email protected]

21 January 2015
 Topics to be Covered
• Assessing student’s perception regarding why Bangladesh Studies should
be taught for the students of BBA
• Outlining the Geo-Physical Landscapes of Bangladesh
• Geography of Bangladesh
• Landform Features
• Formation of Bangladesh Delta: Role of Himalayas, River, and Flood
• Weather and Climate
• Weather-related natural hazards
 References
• Chapter 2. Phillips, Douglas A. and Gritzner, Charles F. 2007.
Bangladesh. New York: Chelsea House Publishers
• Chapter 1. Willem Van Schendel. 2009. A History of
Bangladesh. New Delhi: Cambridge University Press
Location of Bangladesh

Between 20°.34′ and

26°38′ North Latitude
and 88°.01′ and 92°41′
East Longitude.
Geographic Location and Border of Bangladesh
• Bangladesh a deltaic region is situated to the South of Asia Continent, in
between 20°.34′ and 26°38′ North Axis as well as 88°.01′ and 92°41′ East
Longitude.
• The Tropic of Cancer passes through (23°.5′) over the middle of Bangladesh.
• The maximum extent of East-West 440 km, and the maximum extent from
north-northwest to south-southeast 760 km.
• Bangladesh has 430 miles (690 km) coastline along the Bay of Bengal in the
South.
• 180 miles (290 km) land border in the southeast with Myanmer.
• The rest of the country is bounded by India in all sides by a long border of
1740 miles (2800km).
• West Bengal of India, Meghalaya and Assam are situated to the North of
Bangladesh; Assam, Tripura, Mizoram and Myanmar to the East; the Bay of
Bengal to the South and West Bengal of India to the West of Bangladesh.
• A total area of Bangladesh is 1,47,570 square kilometers or 56,977 square
miles.
 Landform Features of Bangladesh
• Nearly all of Bangladesh (roughly 80 percent) is a very flat alluvial plain that
has built up gradually over hundreds of thousands of years from silt
deposited by the three rivers that flow into and across the country.
• Only the Chittagong Hills, located in the far southeast corner of the country,
break the monotony of otherwise quite featureless terrain.
• Even there, near Keokradong, the elevation only rises to about 4,000 feet
(1,219 meters).
• Much of the country’s territory is situated on river deltas. The Ganges,
Jamuna, and Meghna rivers join near the center of the country.
Downstream from the capital of Dhaka, the combined streams break
into many distributaries (deltaic channels) that flow into the Bay of
Bengal.
• This very low-lying depositional plain area goes by several names,
including the Lower Gangetic Plain, the Mouths of the Ganges, and
the Sundarbans.
• Because the land is flat and also composed of fertile alluvium, about
two-thirds of the country is suitable for farming or grazing.
•
Formation of Bangladesh Delta
The formation of Bangladesh delta has been influenced by three sources of water:
• River water
• Rain water
• Seawater
• River water: The Himalayan Mountain snow melting in the spring and summer and
the icy water sweeps along particles of soil, forming into rivers that rush to the sea.
• These rivers reach the lowlands, they slow down and deposit those particles
building up a delta.
• On the southern side of Himalayas is the Ganges that follows eastwards through
Nepal and India for hundreds of KM before it enters Western Bangladesh
(Rajshahi), where it is known as the Padma.
• The Ganges is around 8 km wide.
• On the northern side of the Himalayas is the Brahmaputra, forms in Tibet and
travels through Nepal and north-eastern of India and enters into the Bangladesh
through the northern part of Bangladesh (Rangpur) and known as Jamuna.
• The Brahmaputra is around 18 km wide.
• Both of these revers met in central Bangladesh.
• This age-old process has created the territory -a territory that pushes back the sea
a little further with every annual deposit of new silt.
• Not all the silt passed through the river from the Himalayas end up in Bangladesh.
Every year, over a billion metric tons are delivered to the Indian Ocean, building up
the world’s largest under water delta, which is known as Bengal Fan.
 Formation of Bangladesh Delta
• Rain Water:
• The rain water helps to turn the soft soil into knee-deep muddy slush.
• The sheer amount of rain water discharged over Bangladesh is really very
impressive.
• It is the rain that has made Cherrapunji a household word among
meteorologists the world over.
• This little village just across the border between north-eastern Bangladesh
and India claims to be world’s wettest place.
• Annually a staggering 11 mitres of rain fall here.
• Sea Water: Sea water is a third companion of life in Bangladesh.
• Saline water from the Bay of Bengal penetrates upto 100km of inland and
lower delta becomes salty.
 Weather and Climate of Bangladesh
• Most of Bangladesh experiences a seasonally wet and dry tropical
(in the south and east) and subtropical (in the west and north)
climate. Temperatures are warm throughout the year.
• Summers are very hot and muggy, averaging about 80°F (27°C).
Unlike most of the world, however, the hottest month is April—just
before the cooling (but drenching) monsoons arrive. Summer
afternoon temperatures typically climb into the low to mid-90s°F
(33 to 35°C) with record highs hovering around 110 to 112°F (44°C).
• Because of the high humidity, however, a typical summer afternoon
will actually feel like a scorching (and dripping!) 115 to 120°F (46 to
49°C).
• Winters are mild, with temperatures averaging in the 60s°F (16
to22°C). January is the coldest month.
 Weather and Climate of Bangladesh
• Four primary factors combine to create the weather (the day-to-day
conditions of the atmosphere) and climate (the long-term average
conditions of the weather): the country’s latitudinal position, compact
area, low elevation, and abundance of water.
• The country’s latitudinal position accounts for its tropical
temperatures. Located between roughly 21 and 26 degrees north.
• The fact that nearly the entire country experiences similar
temperatures is accounted for by its compact area and uniformly low
elevation. An abundance of water also helps account for the lack of
temperature extremes (water surfaces help to moderate
temperatures).
• What sets Bangladesh and much of the remainder of South Asia apart
from the rest of the world is its unique pattern of winds and
precipitation—the monsoons.
• Some areas of Bangladesh receive well over 80 inches (200
centimeters) of rain per year. However, some areas in the northeastern
part of the country receive twice that amount.
• Even the drier western portion of Bangladesh receives more than 60
inches (152 centimeters) of precipitation each year.
 Weather and Climate of Bangladesh
• Heavy rainfall is typical of Bangladesh. Yet drought is a major
concern each year for many residents. How can this be?
• The answer lies in the nature of the monsoons and the seasonal
patterns of precipitation that result from these winds. In fact, more
than three-fourths of all rain falls during a four-month monsoon
season.
• During the winter months, winds are from the north, blowing
southward from a high-pressure system located in eastern Siberia.
These winds are very dry.
• During the summer, usually beginning in June and ending in early
autumn, the winds reverse. They blow from a high-pressure system
over the Indian Ocean northward to an area of low pressure located
over Southwest Asia. As the winds sweep across the tropical waters
of the equatorial Indian Ocean, they pick up huge amounts of
moisture. It is this moisture that drenches Bangladesh during the
monsoon season.
Weather-Related Natural Hazards in Bangladesh: Flood
• These three forms of water-river, rain and sea-give Bangladesh a natural Janus face.
• In winter, the rivers shrink their beds, the skies are quietly blue and saline water
gently trickles in. Nature appears to be benign and nurturing.
• In summer, however, nature is out of control and Bangladesh turns into an
amphibious land. Rivers widen, rains pour down and storms at sea may hamper the
discharge of all this water. The result is flooding.
• Summer floods are a way of life in Bangladesh. About 20 percent of the country is
inundated every summer, mainly as a result of rainfall.
• Rivers may cause flooding as well. Usually the big rivers reach their peak flows at
different times but if they peak together, they will breach their banks and inundate
the floodplain.
• Although most floods are caused by rainfall and inundation in deltaic rivers, they
may also result from flash-floods after heavy rain in the hills, pushing their way
through the delta, or by tidal storm surges.
• This combination of rainfall, river inundation, flash-floods and storm surges has
made it impossible to control summer flooding in Bangladesh.
• Even today, the timing, location and extent of flooding are very difficult to predict,
let alone control and floods vary considerably from year to year. Every few years big
floods occur and occasionally, during extreme floods, over 70 percent of the
country is covered by water.
Weather-Related Natural Hazards in Bangladesh: Flood
• From the view point of human life, flooding has had both positive and negative
effects.
• Annual floods constantly replenish some of the most fertile soils on earth. Rich
silt has always allowed luxuriant natural vegetation and made early and
successful agriculture possible.
• But the uncontrollable nature of floods, and the certainty of severe inundation
every ten years or so, have played havoc with human life as well.
• It is not the amount of water that determines the harmful effects of flooding as
human life in Bangladesh has long been adapted to cope with regular
inundation.
• It is the force with which the water pushes through and the number of days it
stays on the land. Thus, a flash flood or storm surge can be very destructive,
even though the amount of the area affected is not very large.
• Coastal flooding in 1991 through the storm surge took the lives of 140000
population despite having a good warning system. 70 percent of the population
in coastal villages wiped out.
• In contrast to the very destructive cyclone floods, a rain or river flood can
spread over a much larger area and yet do little harm if it lasts only a few days.
In fact such flood is typically followed by a bumper harvest. But long-term
inundation does pose a serious problem.
Weather-Related Natural Hazards in Bangladesh: Flood
• Living in this environment means living on a constantly moving frontier
between land and water, and it is this moving frontier that dominates the
Bangladesh History.
• Despite regular setbacks, humans have been extraordinarily successful in
using the resources of this risky deltaic environment.
• With a population of more than 1000 per square km, Bangladesh is one of
the mostly populated countries in the world.
• Such a pressure on the land ensures that the ancient environmental
frontier remains of everyday significance.
• Encounters at the water’s edge have become more crucial over time as
Bangladeshis are forced to push the margins of their environment as never
before, settling on low lying land, coastal areas and islands exposed to
storms and floods.
• In this way, some Bangladeshis are forced continually to put themselves
dangerously in water’s way.
Weather-Related Natural Hazards in Bangladesh: Flood
• In Bangladesh the natural environment has never been a mere backdrop
against which human history unfolded. On the contrary, time and again
natural forces have acted as heroes in that history, upsetting social
arrangements and toppling rulers.
• For example, in the 1780s an earthquake and floods forced the
Brahmaputra river into a new channel, wiping out villages in its course and
causing trade centres along its old channel to collapse.
• More recently, in 1970, the mishandling of cyclone damage (kills 350000-
500000 people) robbed the government of its legitimacy and precipitated
a war of independence.
• Floods in 1988 cost Bangladesh more than that year’s entire national
development budget.
Weather-Related Natural Hazards in Bangladesh: Storms
• On average, about 16 cyclones roar up the Bay of Bengal and
strike Bangladesh each decade, or between one and two per
year.
• Winds can exceed 100 miles per hour and destroy structures,
trees, crops, and most everything else in their path.
• The drenching rains that accompany the storms often cause
severe flooding. The greatest destruction in a rather limited
area, however, comes from the accompanying storm surge. It
is this phenomenon that takes the greatest toll of life and
inflicts the greatest damage to property.
• Tornadoes do occur in Bangladesh, however, and in 1989, a
deadly tornado struck near Dhaka in the central part of the
country and killed an estimated 1,300 people.
Weather-Related Natural Hazards in Bangladesh: Drought
• It may seem strange to suggest that drought, or a seasonal
lack of water, also poses a threat to many Bangladeshis.
• The drought problem stems from two factors:
• The seasonality of precipitation and the distribution of
settlement. The wet monsoon season lasts for approximately
four months, during which as much as 80 percent of the
annual precipitation is received. The remaining eight months
of the year (October through May) are relatively dry. Small
streams dry up and disappear, shallow wells go dry, and fields
become parched. Bangladesh and most of its people are very
poor. They cannot afford elaborate water-diversion projects.
Because of the very flat terrain, it is not possible in most
places to build dams that would store water in reservoirs.
• A second problem involves where people live. Because of
river flooding, many people live on interfluves, the higher
ground located between rivers. Because of their location, they
do not have ready access to stream water.
 Ecosystems & Natural Environment

• An ecosystem includes the interaction of all natural elements

as they affect plant and animal life.
• A major influence on ecosystem is weather and climate.
Landforms and water features also play an important role.
Temperatures and exposure to the sun (influencing
evaporation from the soil and the surface of water, and
transpiration, the release of moisture through the leaves of
plants) influence plant life and animal habitat.
• But in Bangladesh, these elements play only a minor role.
• Climate is relatively similar throughout the entire country—
hot and wet, with a marked seasonal distribution of
precipitation to which plants must adapt. Elevation, too, is
fairly constant throughout the country.
 Ecosystems & Natural Environment
• A map of potential natural vegetation shows that most of Bangladesh falls
within two vegetative zones: tropical rain forest in the southern deltaic
area of the country and semi-deciduous mixed forest elsewhere.
• In a country with such a high population density, however, these
distinctions are all but meaningless. Humans have altered the natural
vegetative landscape for millennia, resulting in very little “natural”
vegetation or original animal life habitat.
• In fact, only in the more remote upland areas and coastal rain forest zone
do even small parcels of land have patches of natural woodlands where
some wildlife can be found.
• Insects, birds, fish, and reptiles (some of which are deadly poisonous) are
found everywhere. Of the larger wild animals, the best known is the
famous Bengal tiger, found mainly in the coastal rain forest region.
Unfortunately, these magnificent animals are being threatened with
extinction as their habitat is penetrated and destroyed by the country’s
burgeoning population.
• There are few places in the world where people are more dependent upon
nature’s offerings, more susceptible to nature’s forces, or have altered
nature to a greater degree than in Bangladesh.