Outstanding climate change project is recognised by The Charity Awards

A three-year £3 million programme supporting more than 100,000 people to protect themselves against disasters and climate change has made the shortlist at The Charity Awards 2017.

The programme reached out to remotely located people in one of the world’s most vulnerable countries to climate change and natural disasters.

Communities in north west and southern coastal areas of Bangladesh have been battered by heavy rains and flash flooding, cutting off access and putting people, housing, livestock and crops at severe risk.

Islamic Relief’s Enhancing Climate Change Adaptation and Disaster Resilience Project (ECCADR) has helped people in remote locations to prepare for potential disasters and to adapt to environmental changes by excavating canals for irrigation, constructing roads for better access, building biogas plants and introducing early warning systems ahead of cyclones or floods.

Local representatives have been trained to respond effectively to disasters in their communities, implementing innovative solutions and early alert systems that are benefiting 27,000 households (around 170,000 people).

Around 2,400 vulnerable households received first-hand training in a variety of new ways to make a living, from fish farming to tailoring, with support to become self-sufficient.

Where a significant proportion of a fisherman’s income, for example, might have been used to rent his boat from someone else, the programme would support him to buy his own.

Key achievements:

• Over the course of the project the average family monthly income almost trebled.
• 97% of newly employed methods of earning a living are continuing successfully.
• Previously it had been impossible for people to have personal savings but for most people this has changed, with one woman reporting personal savings of 100,000 Bangladeshi Taka (£969).

The winner in the category of international aid and development will be announced at the awards in London on June 8.

Find out more about our work in Bangladesh here.

Source: Islamic Relief Worldwide (IRW)