BANGLADESH Rebuilding homes means rebuilding lives

CARE’s Shelter and Reconstruction Advisor, Philip Barritt, recently returned from Bangladesh where he visited a DFID-funded Flood Resistant Shelter project (FRESH), part of the National Alliance for Risk Reduction and Response Initiatives (NARRI) consortium.

Following the devastating flooding and waterlogging in Bangladesh in 2011, CARE – along with ActionAid (AAid), Concern World Wide (CWW), Islamic Relief (IR), Oxfam GB (OGB), and Solidarités International (SI) – launched an immediate response. As part of this, the team is now constructing over 11,000 flood resistant housing and latrines. The aim is to reduce the loss of assets as a result of yearly floods, which cause annual devastation in many communities.

I visited the village of Noapara, which looks for everybody as if it had been built in a lake. Paths and houses stand inundated; stagnating, waist-deep, in this year’s flood waters. These homes have been that way since August. For families still living under tarpaulin shelters since the 2011 monsoon destroyed their homes, the rains this year have brought more hardship.

To protect these families against future floods, we are building new houses upon raised, brick-walled plinths to elevate them above flood level, with deeply embedded precast concrete columns for added strength. With the area also prone to cyclones, the roof and superstructure are designed to resist the high winds.

The project is now halfway through. My visit to the affected area revealed to me that even though the construction work is not complete, the impact of the improvements is already being felt. Jesmin and her family had been living in a small temporary shelter for nearly a year. The cramped space had made day-to-day activities extremely difficult and she worried that with the monsoon approaching they would again be displaced by the flood waters. However, even with her improved shelter only half-finished Jesmin was able to move onto the raised plinth before the flood waters arrived.

When I asked her to describe the benefits of the new shelter, Jesmin spoke of her relief at being raised above the flood water and having a proper CGI (metal) roof. She described how she and her family felt more rooted and secure. However, to me one comment stood out: I noticed that my children's school work has improved. “They could not concentrate in the old house as it was too small and they did not sleep well. Now they have better concentration and they come home from school and have space to do their work. My children have better attention, it is so much better for them now. We are also able to pray properly in the new house.”

As a shelter advisor at CARE, much of my time is spent looking at the technical and risk reduction measures of the houses that we construct. How many of us, in the developed west, think about these things in relation to our own homes? We don’t. In fact, just like Jesmin, we think about how we live in the space and what it enables us to do.

Providing shelter in response to emergencies is much more than protection from the elements. It is about enabling the creation of homes. Rebuilding a family’s home allows them to rebuild every other aspect of their lives.

Read more about our work in Bangladesh.

About CARE: Founded in 1945 with the creation of the CARE Package, CARE is a leading humanitarian organization fighting global poverty. We have more than six decades of experience delivering emergency aid during times of crisis. CARE began operating in Bangladesh (then East Pakistan) in 1949. Today, CARE Bangladesh amplifies the voices of the poor and the marginalized in ways that influence public opinion, development practices and policy at all levels by drawing on grassroots experience and relationships with civil society, government, and the private sector.