Monitoring of the Coastal Change Trends in Bangladesh

In the context of changing climate many projections for Bangladesh estimate a rise in sea level of around 1 meter by the year 2100. This would mean an inundation of approximately 18% of the land surface of the country. However, what these estimates fail to recognize is the extremely dynamic and changing nature of the river delta. The river morphology is constantly changing, depositing over a billion tons of sediment a year into the delta. These processes are crucial for renewing the fertility of the flood plain — Bangladesh’s backbone for economical and societal stability. The EO services were aimed at contributing to the scientific debate on the net result of high accretion and deposition rates which add land surface, against the erosion and compaction rates which reduce the land surface. The rates of loss or gain of land are usually calculated by comparison of satellite images acquired at different points in time. The difficulty with applying this approach in Bangladesh lied however in the existence of strong tidal range (difference between water levels at low tide and high tide) which in combination with flat coast morphology in the Ganges Delta could have resulted in misinterpretation of the extended tidal flat areas as land loss or gain. Therefore the project was a proof-of-concept to develop two new methodologies.

Technical Officer: Pierre-Philippe Mathieu

Starting Date: 2011-11-01

Suppliers:
Planquadrat Geoinformation as supplier - prime
Geographic Resource Analysis & Science Ltd. as supplier - sub

Users:
World Bank as user - partner/collaborator

Services:
coastal bathymetry and coastline mapping (Coastal Zone Management)