Climate change and cultural responses of indigenous people : a case from Bangladesh

Abstract

In recent decades, climate change has become a great concern all over the world and indigenous people especially those who live in remote area and depend on natural resources are most vulnerable to this extremity. This research project is an attempt to find out the key indicators of cultural responses of indigenous people for adaption in climate change extremity. For conducting this study, 25 in-depth interviews were adopted by employing semi-structured and open-ended questionnaire to indigenous people in Rangamati sadar of Rangamati district in Bangladesh. The findings of the study indicate that indigenous people have idea about climate change and they get this idea from different media i.e., television, FM radio, local newspaper, peer groups etc. and blame developed countries for the causes of climate change events. The findings also indicate that for adapting to climate change, local people develop their own strategies, like planting trees surrounding their houses, performing religious activity, rendering mutual help to each other, taking relief or financial support from others for investment, applying indigenous technology, changing occupations etc. in their community. Very few empirical studies were conducted on cultural adaption of indigenous people in climate change, so this project findings can help policy makers as well as government to formulate policy to uplift this community in near future.