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Rice TodayApril-June 2008

the winds started to pickup during the afternoon of

what should have been anormal Thursday in southern

Bangladesh. There had been warningsof a storm, somewhere out in the Bayof Bengal, heading toward the coast.But the people of Chornajir Village

didnt think things would get too bad.Besides, there was work to

be done in the elds and thenearest shelter was a long walkaway, especially for the youngchildren. If it rains, so be it.

Hopefully, the crops will be OK.As evening approached, though,

it became clear that 15 November2007 would not be a normal

Thursday. Chornajir, like most ofthe villages in Patuakhali District, is

poor. People scrape by from seasonto season, trying to grow enoughrice to feed themselves and maybesell a little if theyre lucky. Its a

precipitous existence: one failed crop,one big ood, and it can send peoplespiraling into destitution. And, atthis level of poverty, the channels

of communication, which shouldbring news of oods and storms,dont always work like they should.

Cyclone Sidr, a category-4brute with peak w inds of 250kilometers per hour, slammed into

the southern Bangladesh coastin the evening. By the time the

villagers of Chornajir, around 20kilometers inland, realized this was

more than a common storm, it wastoo late to get to the shelter safely.

If youve never beenBangladesh, you may noat the country is. Aparin the southeast and no

land rarely gets more thmeters above sea level. effectively an enormous

by the conuence of the

Brahmaputra, and Megand their tributaries, wthe Himalayan snowmetheir way toward the Ba

Hundreds of rivers crisscross their way out

end result being an entithat oods like a bathtutoo much. Add to that ainduced tidal surge and

understand how devaststorm can be here. In 19killed up to half a millioof the largest single disahuman history. In 1991,

cyclone killed more thanterms of the cost to hum

was not as brutal, causi

of around 4,000 peoplea major disaster by any

Fortunately, it struck atthe surge was not as pomight have been. And, dcommunication breakd

Chornajir residents in ggreat number of people of the many cyclone she

AfTeR The SToRmStory and photos by Adam Barclay

In the aftermath of Cyclone Sidr, the rice farmers of southern Bangladesh

are struggling to get back on their feet. Immediate relief is needed, but

science can provide technologies that help minimize the damage caused by

the next disaster.

nasiRuDDin Khan rv w l r r r w dvd b cl sdr nvmbr 200.

modisRaPidResPonsePRoJeCtat

nasa/gsFC

cycLone siDR 14 nvmbrd br lmmd B

MiLLions oF southeRn Bldwr rd mk rcl sdr drd r m.

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20 Rice TodayApril-June 2008 Rice TodayApril-June 2008

been built in the past three dec ades.As the wind strengt hened and

the rain hammered, the oodwatersgrew. First, the rice crops wentunder, then the lower houses andhuts. Some people, such as Hasinaand her husband, tried to make it

to the nearest shelter. Soon afterthey set off, the water had risenabove the level of the road. Hasinashusband carried their 7-year-old

daughter. Just staying on the now-invisible road was almost impossible;holding onto a child at the sametime proved too much. Amid the

chaos, deafened by the screamingwind, Hasinas daughter was sweptaway. Like thousands of others, she

wasnt found until it was too late.It was a sickening blow to a

family already doing it tough. There

was precious little ti me to grieve,thoughin the wake of tragedy,Hasina and her husband were forcedto turn their thoughts to nding food

and caring for their remaining family.Nazma Begum was luckier. Her

husband and son made it throughunscathed. But her livelihood wasswept away in the muddy water.

The small hut in which she and herfamily lived was ruined. Her 0.8-hectare rice eld, from which she

and her husband expected to harvestthe food that would prevent them

from going hungry, was destroyed.The seeds she had stored to use thefollowing season were gone as well,along with the familys few chickens,

their vegetable crop, and almostall of their personal belongings.

In all, Sidr affected around 2

did not produce grain.Farmers chances of recovering

some of the crop depended on afew days, really, in terms of crop

development, says Dr. Johnson.Sidr prompted millions of

Bangladeshis to wonder how theywould feed themselves until thenext harvest and, perhaps worse,

with so many farmers losing theirseed, they were unable to sow theirboro crops, the seedling nurseriesfor which should have been planted

in November and Decemberfor transplanting in January.Compounding the problem was thedestruction ofboro seedbedsinPatuakhali, around 60% were

affectedand damage to irrigationcanals, which allowed highly saline

water into the fresh water beingstored for the dry season. Barring

how can rice resea

Following their visit to souin December 2007 to assin areas hit by Cyclone SidrAbdelbagi Ismail, ZainulJohnson, and M.A. Hamwith their BRRI counterppreliminary plans or resemitigating this sort o disa

The researchers diobservations at a series othe Secretary o the MinistMd. Abdul Aziz, the BangladResearch Council (inclu

Director Nurul Alam), and Rural Advancement CommExecutive Director Mahabu

Suggested intermediateprotect and enhance arincluded

1. New varieties with suo submergence, salinitfooding, but with highecurrent local varieties nand out-scaled in cycloprone areas. These incluvarieties already develoBRRI, and salt-tolerant vcurrently being developewith tolerance o submefooding, and salinity tested with armers tolines or urther evaluat

2. Crop management and crostrategies could help ra

to ensure higher and moand ood security. Increaor dry-season (boro andas other upland crops (sweet potato, maize, awould help reduce revulnerable aman-seasyields are oten low anharsh conditions. Divehelp ensure sucient or armers i they lose their aman rice produce

further disasters, many farmers arelooking at a November-December2008 aman harvest or, at best, an

aus crop (grown by some farmers

between the wet and dry seasons),to be harvested in mid-2008.

But thats only half the problem.Each wet season, the farmers heresave their crops best seeds, with

which they plant the next wetseasons crop. Following Sidr, eventhough some farmers managed tosalvage some rice, it was of such poor

quality as to be useless for seed.Urgent short-term measures

are needed to ensure sufcientseed supplies for these farmers,

particularly for 2008, explainedIRRI scientist Abdelbagi Ismailduring his visit to Patuakhali inDecember 2007. This is becausemost farmers lost their rice cropand the grain yield of the remaining

crop is expected to be very low, andwill mostly be consumed wit hina few months. Besides, harvestedgrain is likely to be unsuitable for

seed for the next transplanted amanseason because of low quality.

Condemned to as much as ayears reliance on food aid, familiesare left wondering how theyll

manage. Moreover, most of thecrops grown in these areas are local

varieties adapted to saline and

waterlogged conditions. Seeds ofthese varieties are hard to replace.

It looks like Ill get less than halfa ton from my 6 acres [2.4 hectares],lamented Nasiruddin Khan, a ricefarmer from Purbohajipur Village,

Patuakhali. Last year, I got 5 tons.I dont know how well get enoughfood in the coming months.

WhenRiceToday visitedPurbohajipur inDecember 2007,

Nasiruddin washarvesting whatmuddy, attene drice remainedin his eld. He

said he woulduse the straw foranimal feed butthat much of the

recoverable grainhad begun to rot and tasted bitter.

Nasiruddins neighbor, AliAkbar, harvested 10 tons fromhis 4 hectares in 2006. In 2007,

he was expecting around 1 ton. Itwas a story repeated over and overacross southern Bangladesh.

A recent report issued by theCentre for Policy Dialogue and

Bangladesh Rural AdvancementCommittee (BRAC) warns that,following the cyclone and twomajor oods earlier in 2007, the

country is now facing a shortageof at least 3 million tons of rice.

We usually have a rice shortageof 11.5 million tons a year, but,

because of recurrent naturaldisasters, there will be an additionalshortage of 1.9 million tons,Mahabub Hossain, BRAC executivedirector, said in January 2008.

Adding to the burden for the

millions aficted, the shortages

have come at a time of hrising global rice priceshigher prices for consum

whom have already lostThe countrys dire situa

was recognized by the F

Agriculture Organi zatioUnited Nations, which i

2007 added Bangladeshof 37 countries facing a and requiring external

To see what role IR

play both in response toand to mitigate the effeccyclonespredicted to

million familiescomprisingaround 9 millionpeople. More

than 1.5 millionhomes weredestroyed. Justas distressing,around 1

million hectaresof cropspredominantly

wet-season

(known astransplantedaman) rice

were damaged or ruined. Across thewhole affected area (see map, below),

average crop loss was 50%. Close torivers and the coast, though, farmerssuffered complete loss of their crops.

International Rice ResearchInstitute (IRRI)

weed scientistDavid Johnson,

who visited theSidr-affected

area in December2007, pointsout that anothercritical issue was

the stage of plantgrowth whenthe oods hit,

which happenedto be around theowering period.

The effects onthe rice cropappeared to bequite different,

depending onwhether it wasat, before, orafter owering,

which lasts about

a week. Farmersrecovered atleast some rice if

the crop was hitbefore or after

owering. If theoods and windshit a oweringcrop, though, the

plants becamecompletelysterile and

iRRis ZainuL aBeDin lk b sdrm w Mmm Kdj Bm(far right) rm Mlbd Vll

r Bld.

the cycLone DestRoyeD rdr r Bld.i m , lm mk r w drwd w mbkm lld.

a giRL FRoM Mlbd Vll, w w rd b sdr.

nuMBeR oF peopLe d b cl sdr.t ld l d lvk klld rjrd, d dmd r drd m,bld, rd, d r.

Source: Disaster Management Information Centre, Disaster Management Bureau,Bangladesh Ministry of Food and Disaster Management

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22 Rice TodayApril-June 2008 Rice TodayApril-June 2008

greater frequency because of climatechangeInstitute scientists Dr.Ismail, Dr. Johnson, Zainul Abedin,

and M.A. Hamid Miah traveledto southern Bangladesh on 14-16December 2007. They were joined byrepresentatives from the Bangladesh

Rice Research Institute (BRRI),the Department of AgriculturalExtension, and two nongovernmentalorganizationsAction Aid and

SPEED Trustworking on theIRRI-coordinated Food Securityfor Sustainable HouseholdLivelihoods (FoSHoL) project.

All groups, along with several

others, including BRAC, are helpingaffected families get back on theirfeet. It is an enormous task. BRRI and

BRAC both jumped in immediatelyto distribute seeds, but getting holdof enough was proving difcult, witharound 20,000 tons required to meet

the expected shortfall. Abu Saleque,principal scientic ofcer andhead of the BRRI Research Stationin Barisal District just north of

Patuakhali, says that, to cover lossesdue to Sidr, BRRI is helping farmersto grow transplanted aus rice.

BRRI is supplying boro seeds tofarmers and is also encouraging more

farmers to growboro rice, explainsDr. Saleque. In Barisal District,only 40% of the rice area (107,000

hectares) is planted to boro rice.One major constraint, says

Dr. Saleque, is that farmersmust be organized. For example,

water allocation is a problem,as is the practice of allowinglivestock to graze on aman cropresiduefarmers would need to

coordinate to ensure that animalsdont eat newly planted boro rice.

If the coming rice seasons areto be successful, the bare minimumneeded by farmers is seeds, fertilizer,

and help with land preparation. Ifdraft animals werent killed in thecyclone, their feed was most likely

lost. As a result, many farmers haveeither lost or ceased to keep animals.

Although any rice crop hitdirectly by a full-force cyclone is sure

to be damaged, new varieties withsufcient tolerance of submergence,salinity, and oodingbut withhigher yields than currently

grown local varietiesneed to bedeveloped, tested, and out-scaledin southern Bangladesh and othercyclone-prone areas. Subsequentincreased production, combined with

storage facilities that can withstandooding, can buffer Bangladeshifarmers against future catastrophe.

For this kind of disaster, itsvery difcult to design variet iesthat can withstand this kind ofdevastationeven human beings are

not able to do that, says Dr. Ismail.But you can develop certain traitsthat can mitigate the effects. We canalso see what varieties are available

that can be used immediately afterthe ood, because we expect tosee residual salinity, high iron,and other changes in surface soildue to debris brought by seawater.

Tolerant varieties will aa good start to the next

According to Dr. Jo

important role in IRRIis to reduce the vulnerarice production systemsthrough that, the vulne

of peoples livelihoods.We saw a gradient

areas that were seriouslto areas that were less s

says. One hope is, if immaterials are available tolerance of some of thecaused by an event like proportion of the area tseriously affected will b

Dr. Hossain points that the Sidr aftermath offers an opportunity tolivelihoods in the long r

of crisis, thats the timenew ideas to farmers, h

During the IRRI scin December 2007, discpredominantly about acdistribution, next seasopreparation, research totechnologies to minimiz

after the next cyclone, aImportantly, says Dr. A

are not the types of acticreate dependence: theyto not only get people bfeet, but also keep them

Cash relief, he saysomething people will uthey need somethi ng fo

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