| Title of the project: | Sundarbans Adjacent Fishers Enabling to Resilience Building (SAFER) Project’ |
| Project area: | Paikgachha Upazila of Khulna District |
| Project Duration: | 2015 to 2019 |
| Beneficiaries: | 300 fishermen from 44 seagoing traditional fishing boats and their 191 families which make a total 897 direct beneficiaries. |
Short description of Project:
The southwest coastal region of Bangladesh is a climate hotspot and one of the most vulnerable areas in the world to natural disaster. Around one million people in this region are involved with fishing in the estuaries and most cyclone-prone Bay of Bengal. Recently the rate of cyclones and sea depressions increased which creates risks for fisher communities. When they fishing in the Bay and faces sea depression then they have two options only: (i) Coming back without any fish or (ii) Taking risk of life by sinking. Resulting, fishermen have to sell assets to repay loan which taken before the trip and involuntarily migrated due to poverty and limitation of livelihood options. In some cases, they are washed out by the wind and tide, rescued by the marine forces of neighboring countries and faced jail as illegal intruders. The fishers contribute to our food security, livelihoods and economic growth. These communities are living an inhuman life year-round. But their contribution to our society is ongoing.
In this context AOSED initiated a new idea to ‘establish a climate resilient fisher community in Southwest Coastal Region of Bangladesh for long term livelihoods safety and improvement with the cooperation of Give2Asia.
Key activities: Developed and installed ‘Vessel Tracking System’ in the traditional seagoing fishing boats. Establishing a small central monitoring hub for regular live communication and exchanging signals. Enhanced knowledge and capacity of fisher communities and linkage building with respective institutions.
Achievement:
- Developed and installed Vessel Tracking System (VTS) in the seagoing traditionalfishing boatsthat are working effectively.
- Develop active connection system with VTS operating center and Meteorological department through this process operating center are getting weather information in advance and provide to the fishers groups by translating for easy understanding.
- Fisher groups are responding the live communication properly and they are spontaneously sharing this information to other fishers groups in the sea.
- Fisher groups are using safety gear and following the disaster preparedness instruction and radio weather forecast properly.
Fisher groups were able to return 3 times to safe shelter from the deep sea due to sea depression during fishing season in the project period.
